How long is too long
How long should a chapter be?
I always answer this question by saying it depends on the book. I still believe this to be true. Younger readers have shorter attention spans. I think short chapters work great for them, especially if the chapter ends with a cliff-hanger to makes the reader want to peek at the next page and possibly read just one more chapter. For young adult and adult novels, however, I don’t think there is a right or wrong answer. Several of James Patterson’s novels have chapters that are three to five pages. Each chapter is from a different character’s point-of-view. He stops the action early making me have to keep reading to find out what happens next. At the same time, I’ve read books where the chapters are longer—sixteen to twenty-plus pages—but the writing flows and the pacing is good so I don’t notice the number of pages per chapter because I’m enjoying the story too much to care.
I started to think about chapter length when I was revising my newest work-in-progress and hit a chapter that was twenty-eight pages. I started to look at the rest of the chapters and most are between fourteen and eighteen pages. I then pulled books off my bookshelf and counted the number of pages in several chapters. Know what I discovered? Length varied widely by book. Some averaged four pages while others averaged twenty-four pages, backing my theory there is no right or wrong answer. I did divide my twenty-eight- page chapter into two, mostly because it was twice as long as the rest of the chapters in that book and I felt if anything I should keep them uniform.
Do you think about chapter length before you start to write a new novel? Does the length of your chapters depend on the book you’re working on? When you read, do you even notice how long the chapters are?
Published on March 21, 2013 04:00
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