Chapter Structure

[Rob]

What's your preferred strategy? And what do you prefer to read?

Some that I've seen:

The Patterson: Keep it short, keep it sweet and always end with a "wow.. what happens ~next~?"

The Short Story: Long chapters with clear flow up and down that themselves tell an entire scene. May end on a cliff hanger but for the most part represent good "break points" because the action ends at the end of the chapter.

The Patterson Short Story: Like a Short Story where you feel a nice sense of completion and then in the ~last~ sentence there's a teaser for the next chapter.

I'm still working on a document called "Chapter 1" and I can't tell if I want to go break it up into 3 chapters all with little cliff hangers or just let all the action flow together into one long scene and keep it all in chapter as long as we're in that scene.

What do you do/ like to read?

[Ottilie]

I kind of cheat, I have two character's, alternating chapters. When one character is done the other pushes the other one out of the way. The length varies, I don't use a particular page/word length for a chapter.

To read though, as long as it's exciting I don't mind short or long chapters as long as it flows.

[[deleted user]]

i like stories in which there are two characters or events happening, possibly simultaneously, and will eventually collide, and the chapters alternate throughout until the end. that's cool. in one of my projects, not yet available here, there are three different events that alterate chapters until they collide near the end.

i aim for about 8 pages or more in a chapter, but it's not a rule. for some reason it just "feels" better to me. if i get to ten, i'm happy, but i know that i can't let that govern my writing.

[Christopher]

Basically in each chapter I want something to happen. It sounds stupid when I write it down, but that's essentially it -- each chapter is an arc of some sort... either something is concluded or advanced in the course of the chapter, or something new happens that "changes things" at the end of the chapter.

Usually my chapters are between 1500-2000 words, though in the latest thing I'm writing its a bit longer. Occasionally I get very short chapters (400-750 words) which is awkward, but there you go.

[Kevin]

I like to try to end my chapters in suspense or with some sort of mystery if at all possible. This keeps the reader interested and makes them WANT to read that next chapter. Matthew Reilly has an interesting style that doesn't involve chapters, but scenes. He writes his books broken up into scenes, as if from a movie. That's a good technique as well because it makes sure that you have something useful in the chapters. If you have a chapter that doesn't involve anything being resolved, begun, or added to, people won't know what to make of it.

[Edwin]

I don't write by chapter, I write by scene, then combine four scenes into a c-unit for submission for critique or ease of editing.

[Tony]

I guess my books usually follow the three part format of build world / conflict / resolution.

So for the first third of the book, excluding the first chapter (always have a cliff hanger on the first chapter!) I have less cliff hangers and more simple scene changes, and then for the middle and end, more cliffhangers and scene change combinations.

In THE HOST by Stephenie Meyer, she's obsessed with cliff hangers at every chapter - even one where footsteps approach a character in hiding in hospital, and it's nothing more than a nurse who left a few paragraphs ago.

My chapters are simply as long as I make them. I try and accomplish one major plot point in a chapter, then move on to another chapter. Sometimes I can do that in 500 words, or sometimes it takes 4000.

I'd love to write a chapter that was one line.
My absolute favourite one line chapters are an absolute gross-out from Moon by James Herbert, (Gloatingly, it bit into the dead child's heart), and IT by Stephen King (Nothing much happened for the next two weeks).

Kind of a Zen rhythm to the second one I like.

[[deleted user]]

Kevin wrote: "I like to try to end my chapters in suspense or with some sort of mystery if at all possible. This keeps the reader interested and makes them WANT to read that next chapter. Matthew Reilly has an i..."

my chapters tend to end more with something coming to a resolution, but then a slight hint about what is coming next.

[Rob]

my chapters tend to end more with something coming to a resolution, but then a slight hint about what is coming next.

Yeah.. That's what I tended to do too. Though in the last one I was writing day by day so it lent itself to that "write a full scene a day" kind of writing.

[Julie]

The Patterson Short Story: Like a Short Story where you feel a nice sense of completion and then in the ~last~ sentence there's a teaser for the next chapter...


Um, have you been peeking at my work? LOL This is me exactly!

[[deleted user]]

peeking? uh...maybe? ;]

[[deleted user]]

speaking of chapters. here's a link to the first chapter to my book that's in the quarterfinals of amazon.com's breakthrough novel award. it's NOT for kids.

http://brainsnorts.wordpress.com/2012...

[Paula]

I like to write and read fast, snappy, short chapters that propel my characters forward (and the reader).

POV shifts get new chapters.

I ended up with 80 chapters in my 350 page book. It seems to work for me, but forget the Table of Contents!

Paula

[[deleted user]]

Richard wrote: "speaking of chapters. here's a link to the first chapter to my book that's in the quarterfinals of amazon.com's breakthrough novel award. it's NOT for kids.

http://brainsnorts.wordpress.com/2012..."

actually, the first four chapters are there. and if you find it interesting, let me know, and i'll send you the whole thing.

[David]

I like a good cliffhanger at the end of my chapters to keep me going. I find it hard to actually write cliffhangers myself because you find you have to force them.