46 - A book with no chapters / unusual chapter headings / unconventionally numbered chapters

[Novels and Neckties -]

i am reading Trials of Apollo ATM.
i am reading it for the prompt "a book by an author whose first and last name beginn with the same letter", but while i am reading it i noticed that each chapter starts with a funny haiku.
Awesome! ^^
The Hidden Oracle

[Melissa]

I am currently reading Again but better and the book is told in 3 parts and each part starts as chapter 1 and goes from there does that work for this prompt?

[Krissy]

Just started The Running Man and noticed it would fit this prompt so thought I'd share that info

[Therese]

Someone Like Me by M.R. Carey. Beginning tonight! Chapters headed by graphics of bracelets, knives or books or a combination thereof. Intriguing....

[Drakeryn]

Jamie wrote: "Would books told from more than one POV count, if the chapters aren't numbered, just named after the character whose POV is represented in each chapter?"

Personally, I wouldn't count that, because I see it so often it's not really "unconventional." I also wouldn't count epigraphs (I feel like they're reasonably common).

(But I am obviously not the Popsugar police, so if you think it should count, go ahead)

Pretty much any CYOA book would fit this prompt, so if you happen to read two this year, you could put one here.

[L Y N N]

The World's Strongest Librarian: A Memoir of Tourette's, Faith, Strength, and the Power of Family works beautifully for this. He uses Dewey Decimal classifications at the head of each chapter. Quite unique and original! And the book is enjoyable and informative about Tourette's syndrome.

[Rebecca]

Moll Flanders This book has absolutely no chapters, so if you're looking for a classic, then this could be a good choice. It's really amusing.

[Marie-Eve]

Drakeryn wrote: "Jamie wrote: "Would books told from more than one POV count, if the chapters aren't numbered, just named after the character whose POV is represented in each chapter?"

Personally, I wouldn't count..."

Pardon my ignorance, but what is CYOA - i am still looking for a book for this prompt but have no idea what this acronym means! haha

[Brandy]

Chose your own adventure?

[Marie-Eve]

Right! oh wow i didnt even realize that. hehe. thanks!

[Karen]

Brandy wrote: "Chose your own adventure?"

LOL. I read it as cover your own ass.

[Drakeryn]

Karen wrote: "LOL. I read it as cover your own ass."

haha I like this

But yeah, I meant choose-your-own-adventure.

[Jackie]

Karen wrote: "Brandy wrote: "Chose your own adventure?"

LOL. I read it as cover your own ass."

*Giggles uncontrollably*

I mean, can you IMAGINE what that genre would look like??

[Teri]

What about The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo? Each section is titled with one of her husbands' name. I can't decide if this feels right to me or not and need some other opinions.

[Karlie]

I was catching up on some classics this week for another challenge - if you haven't read it yet, Old Man and the Sea has no chapters.

[Lesley]

Deep by James Nestor is about free diving and has interesting chapter headings. They are different depths and you get deeper as the book continues. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...

[Drakeryn]

Teri wrote: "What about The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo? Each section is titled with one of her husbands' name. I can't decide if this feels right to me or not and need some other opinions."

Just personally, I wouldn't count that. Character names as chapter headings are pretty conventional.

[Lori]

Another book I found that can work for this is Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier

[Kara]

Do you think “This Savage Song” would count for this prompt? It’s split up into Epigraph, Verse 1,2,3,4, Elegy. There are chapters, they are within each verse and titled by Roman Numbers.

[Lynette]

Kara wrote: "Do you think “This Savage Song” would count for this prompt? It’s split up into Epigraph, Verse 1,2,3,4, Elegy. There are chapters, they are within each verse and titled by Roman Numbers." Sure, it counts - they are unconventionally numbered, right?

[Angelina]

Panic Room this counts down in sections ten to zero rather than chapters.

[Kirsty]

Does anyone know if Daisy Jones & The Six would count for this prompt? I know the story is told through interviews but I don't know if there are chapter titles as I don't have a copy yet.

[Lyor]

Has anyone read Margaret the First and do you think it fits? Paging through it, it seems like the division is sometimes by time and place ("Antwerp 1649-1651") , and sometimes just no title or number or anything at all, just a blank space at the top half of the page.

[Noa Cohen]

I just finished Mrs Dalloway. I originally was planning on using it for 'A book that takes place in a single day' but I think it works well for this prompt too.

[Susan]

i finally read the Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. It has oddly numbered chapters.

[Maartje]

@kirsty, yes Daisy Jones counts. It has no chapter numbers. It’s told in time periods

[Nadine in NY]

I'm reading The Raven Tower by Ann Leckie and it has no chapters.

[Anabell]

I just finished A is for Arsenic: The Poisons of Agatha Christie and there no chapters. Don't know if it has been mentioned earlier.

A new chapter is done like this:

A
Arsenic

Murder Is Easy (the Agatha Christie novel title that will be used to compare the description on how the poisen works etc.

''The poison of kings and the king of Poison''- Anon.

[Michele Lynn]

I just finished The Hot Rock and I'm wondering if it would fit here. Technically it's still numbered but like this:
Phase One
One
Two
Three and so on until...
Phase Two where the chapter count starts all over from the beginning
One
Two etc.
There are five phases each with it's own chapters starting at one

It's unusual but I'm not sure if it still qualifies. Any advice?

[Jackie]

I'm not sure of this has been posted but Terry Pratchett wrote many books without chapters. Mort, Hogfather and Carpe Jugulum all don't have chapters.

[Kathryn]

I am reading NOS4A2 by Joe Hill for this prompt. The book has chapter titles that run into each other. The chapter titles have cities and states for titles. Sometimes I can’t stop at the end of one chapter because the next word is the beginning of the chapter following it.

[Allie]

I just started reading Redemption Point and realized that it has no chapters! I went back and checked, the first book in this series Crimson Lake also does not have chapters. For any crime/mystery readers out there I would highly recommend the series

[L Y N N]

Allie wrote: "I just started reading Redemption Point and realized that it has no chapters! I went back and checked, the first book in this series Crimson Lake also does not have ..."

Ooohhh...this series looks good! Thanks for the recommendation!

[Celena]

I may use Bottled Goods by Sophie Van Llewyn if I don’t find anything else... it’s “chapters” are 2-3 page vignettes that sometimes flow, sometimes jump, and sometimes are just lists or such. While it’s the chapters themselves that are unorthodox rather than the format of the headings, I think it still fits the spirit of the challenge. (Assuming I don’t read something that fits better)

[Danielle]

I just finished Nop's Hope and all of the "chapters" start with sheepdog trial results instead of numbers or traditional headings so I'm using that for this prompt.

[Linda]

The Library Book by Susan Orlean
The chapter headings are listings of books and other library items that relate in some way to what each chapter is about.

[Lorna]

I just finished Less by Andrew Sean Greer. It is the story of Arthur Less who decides to travel the world to escape from the fact his ex is getting married.

The chapter titles are:
Less At First
Less Mexican
Less Italian
Less German
Less French
Less Moroccan
Less Indian
Less Japanese
Less At Last

Is that unconventional? I feel it is because it uses the the character’s name with each country’s adjective instead of just the country name.

[E]

I have signed up for too many challenges this year (maybe I'll try this next year!), but I thought I'd post a book I read recently that would fit this prompt:

A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers

It's science fiction and a loose sequel to The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet (which you could TOTALLY use for the 'set in space' prompt). A Close and Common Orbit has names as chapter headings (for 2 POVs), and one of the POVs adds the age for the character at the time the chapter is set. Those are set in the past.

I enjoyed the book, but it was a bit of a pain to buddy read with a friend of mine since chapter names were repeated. I ended up figuring the percentage completed with my print edition so I could match up with her e-reading.

(Apologies if this is a repeated rec. I was being lazy and didn't feel like going through all the comments, haha.)

[Eleanour]

The Overstory by Richard Power fits, and as a bonus, just won the Pulitzer Prize. It is about people and trees and the sections are labeled for tree-parts: “Roots” gives the background of the characters “Trunk” weaves their stories together “Crown” draws the storylines to a close and “Seeds” foretells the next phase.

[Trish]

I'm reading Night by Elie Wiesel, and it doesn't have chapter numbers! It's a short and incredibly powerful memoir for those interested in the Holocaust.

I'm teaching it to my students right now and realized it would fit in with this prompt after they were arguing with one another about which chapter was chapter 5 or 6!

[Solenn]

I'm reading The curious incident of the dog in the night-time by Mark Haddon which fits under the unconventionally numbered chapters. Really enjoying it

[Ashley]

Milkman

[Charlotte]

Somebody has already mentioned it... Looking for Alaska by John Green fits this perfectly.

There are no chapters. There are section breaks that are either the countdown of days or counting the number of days to/from an incident.

[Cat]

I think The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory works for this. I'm reading it, initially thinking that it would have suited the wedding prompt. Watching the film, I definitely recall a wedding, but the book mentions marriage and weddings loads but does not really include a wedding (unless I count the paragraph or two about George Boleyn's wedding with Jane Parker).
Anyway! The chapters are headed with the season and the year of the events contained in the chapter. I reckon that counts as unusual , maybe a way of unconventionally numbering them?

[Maureen]

I recommend Whiskey & Charlie by Annabel Smith. The chapters are letters of the NATO phonetic is alphabet (alpha, bravo, Charlie, delta).

[L Y N N]

Maureen wrote: "I recommend Whiskey & Charlie by Annabel Smith. The chapters are letters of the NATO phonetic is alphabet (alpha, bravo, Charlie, delta)."

I really liked Whiskey & Charlie!

[KF-in-Georgia]

Good grief! I finally finished The Mueller Report: Presented with Related Materials by The Washington Post . I long ago decided it wasn't likely to fit a PopSugar prompt.

But if something like:

Volume I:
V. Prosecution and Declination Decisions.
C. Russian Government Outreach and Contacts.
2. Potential Coordination: Foreign Agent Statutes (FARA and 18 U.S.C. §951).
2.a. Governing Law"

doesn't qualify as an "unusual chapter heading," I don't know what does. Heaven knows, I haven't run into a chapter heading like that in anything else I've read.

[Drakeryn]

Haha! That's great! Definitely unusual chapter headings :D

[Cornerofmadness]

I'm pretty sure someone's mention Terry Pratchett's Discworld books. I just finished Mort for this prompt. There are no chapters at all

[Hilary]

I've been including children's books (middle grade and YA) for my challenge because I've been trying to read a LOT more to my kids. I stumbled on The Jolly Regina "The Unintentional Adventures of the Bland Sisters". It's a very cute book. Each chapter starts with a word and a dictionary definition (in the first book). The second book has a little household tip at the start of each chapter. I'm counting this as my unusual chapter heading.