I wrote my first book in long hand and then typed it out on this old iMac that I loved. And I did research how to format the book and all those little things I needed to do so an editor or agent wouldn't throw it in the trash when they first looked at it.
That first book was a romance and I read all the books and attended a conference where I learned some basic expectations of a publishers. One 'rule of thumb' was that each chapter should be twenty pages long. As a lover of fantasy novels, I already thought the rule a little silly but it was followed rather closely in those days. I wrote my earlier romance novels in the confining style.
I'm not sure if the twenty page chapter is still recommended or not but I seldom think about it anymore. I've read a book in the past week that had a chapter on paragraph long. Some books don't have chapter numbers but titled each chapter by the name of the viewpoint character. It's so much easier to end a chapter when the action or drama calls for it, the whole hook ending, instead of sculpting the story around a page count.
Do you remember being told chapters were to be a certain length? Do you give any thought to how long you make your chapters? Do you care as a reader how long chapters are?
13 comments:
I prefer short chapters. And chapters should have a lot of white on the pages per Stephen King in his book On Writing.
I don't think about how many pages, especially as I don't divide my manuscript into chapters until the very end. Then I just try to end in a good spot while making them all fairly close in size.
I wrote my first novel in longhand, too...and it wasn't all that long ago! I end my chapter when I come to a line that leaves readers wondering what comes next, prompting them to continue on to the next chapter. Always.
James Patterson is well known for his one-page chapters.
A chapter should be as long as it needs to be.
I like a chapter where enough happens to pull me into reading the next chapter.
Some of Dan Brown's chapters are about a page, and it didn't affect his sales. :)
I prefer chapters to end at a logical point rather than a certain length.
I am still so unsavvy with regard to Book Formatting. I am writing in Word. I guess I will figure out how to transfer it to the book publishing restrictions when I get there. In Word, my chapters tend to range from 9-11 pages. I don't know what that equates to on a "book page." Of course, if I felt like the chapter should be shorter - or longer - for the purposes of the story, I would do it.
As long as the story is good and flows nicely, I don't really mind how long chapters are.
I've never heard 20 pages. I am for 10 in Word, but they are usually several pages over or under.
I remember this. My early works have very long chapters. I don't think of chapters in terms of length any more but rather in terms of how the scenes within advance the story.
Isn't it interesting that there are "rules" until someone breaks them? Like always use quotes, until you read "Incredibly Loud Extremely Close" or stay in the same POV until you read, "A Visit From the Goon Squad"
I tend to think of an average chapter length being about 10 pages, but it all depends on whats going on in the scene. I think 20 is fine so long as there's enough going on, but any more than that is a bit excessive.
I kind of don't pay attention to chapter length.. they are as long as they need to be:)
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