How Big??? Chapter Sizes

[Yog-Sothoth]

My chapters are short and sweet, with a cliffhanger at the end of each one - 1500 to 2000 words.

 

[Erin99]

Just as a matter of interest and something I just noticed is that in the grand finale to the Wheel of Time Series, A Memory of Light, by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson the key chapter to the book and I suppose series is the [LEISHA EDITED OUT TITLE NAME, SO OTHERS DON'T GET SPOILERS].

Talking of long chapters it comes in at a colossal 190 pages... now that is a chapter.

Noooooo! That's the second WoT spoiler I've seen in two month in GWD! (The first had *loads* of spoilers in it.)

I've deliberately been avoiding the Jordan section because I'm only up to book three. I'm such a fan - he's absolutely amazing at character voice and POV. But, uh, my partner read the 190-page chapter and loved it (he said it worked very well and he would not have liked it separated out into smaller parts), but he wouldn't tell me the chapter name because he said it was a Big Reveal. Plus, as he says now it's been spoiled, he got such a thrill when opening the book and seeing that chapter name, that thing everyone had been waiting for, in the contents. I won't get that now. Me, at book three, will know that the Big Thing WILL happen and that it won't be stopped...

Anyway, so I'm back on topic, I say chapters should be as long as the scene demands. You shouldn't constrain yourself by working to a set limit. If a chapter is short but action-packed, great. If a chapter is long and monumental, that's great too. Whatever works for whatever you're trying to say.

 

[Ursa major]

To be fair, Leisha, it isn't that spoilery: we already know - I know, and I've read none of Wheel of Time - that A Memory of Light is the last book in the series (which covers the first word of the chapter title) and, I assume (again, not having read any of WoT), there may be a major conflict in that final volume (which deals with the second word).

The only giveaway is that a chapter with that title has 190 pages; but even that doesn't tell you much: for all you and I know, most of those pages might deal with the preparations for, and the aftermath of, the... er... aggressive encounter.

 

[Perpetual Man]

Sorry Leisha, I would hate to think that I'd inadvertently dropped a spoiler in out of nowhere. I just assumed that as the series has been building toward the Last Battle since it started, the fact that there was a chapter named that was hardly a surprise, but that's just me being a smug g*t and I'm prepared to take my punishment*

*But I'm hiding behind Ursa

 

[Erin99]

While I'd love to agree with you, Ursa, the... event... is a specific Major Event that has been prophesied and talked about since book one, but - and I stress this - it has never, before the point I'm at in the series, been referenced as writ in stone and guaranteed. That's part of it's appeal. Prophesies can be wrong. It is not clear whether the event will come to pass - though, I suspect, most believe it will, in one form or other. But though it's been prophesied, I had no idea of how events will unfold in later books or if something else happens to thwart it in another amazing way. Or even if the event happens at all the way it's been prophesied.

I think more than anything, though, I should be very wary of posts here in GWD that mention WoT. I thought staying out of Jordan's section would be enough, but the other spoiler I read the other month told me quite a lot of a future storyline, so now when I read I'm just waiting for said thing to happen, not discovering everything for the first time... It's a shame we don't have spoiler tags here.

But anyway, I'm fine with the 190 pages thing. I knew it already, cos my partner kept exclaiming how lengthy it was and how gripping and wowing it was. But he would never tell me that the prophesied event - which is a major hook throughout the volumes - actually comes to pass. That's one of the hooks in the books, without giving too much away.

Edit: Perp, it's fine. I know you wouldn't mean to ruin anything. I'm just enjoying the books so much (it's a very eye-opening experience for me, actually, and I can see how it will influence everything I write from now on... although book one could have been waaaaay better), I don't want to know what happens or if events believed will happen WILL happen.

 

[Gumboot]

I've been thinking about doing the same thing, although it is only the first chapter that seems to be excessive, the rest are about 5,000 words give or take.

So the question is, is it worth doing it for a chapter that is an introduction and very fast paced?

It really depends if you've got natural breaking points, I think. At first I was very resistant to breaking things up because I had written each chapter with its own structure. But once I started looking I realised most of my chapters had four or five potential break points in them, and indeed some of the new chapter break points actually work better now than they used to.

 

[Glen]

Ahem. It's not the size that matters...it's what you do with it that counts...

 

[Reivax26]

I am working on Chapter 6 of mine now and I have noticed that the word counts on them has varied from chapter to chapter. The Prologue thru Chapter 5 ended up being 36,000 words and 61 pages.