We may recall at this point that the distinction between a single

reaction and multiple reactions is that the single reaction

requires only one rate expression to describe its kinetic behavior
whereas multiple reactions require more than one rate
expression. Since multiple reactions are so varied in type and
seem to have so little in common, we may despair of finding
general guiding principles for design.
Fortunately, this is not so because many multiple reactions can be
considered to be combinations of two primary types: parallel
reactions and series reactions.