Young Writers Society

Whats a good length for a chapter? I was wondering because sometimes I want to do a chapter thats like a page and a half but that seems to short to me. And sometimes I end up with a chapter like ten pages long. So whats a good length?

It doesn't really matter. My chapters (in my current thingymabob) range from a sentence to five pages. It all depends on what effect you're going for.

it depends on your book. if you have moments where something occurs and you only have two pages for it, then that's your chapter. if the occurance goes on ten pages that's another chapter. when the occurance is done it's done, if it goes on for a while, then hey! it goes on.

I tend to have shorter chapters, simply because my related material tends to be shorter. It may also be that I prefer reading books with shorter chapters, since I have a house to run and they provide convenient stopping points. Clean the kitchen, read a chapter. Make the bread, read a chapter. Do one homework assignment, read a chapter. And you get the picture.

So, yeah, as previously said, make the chapters as long or short as they seem to want to be.

Well, mainly the answer is anything goes, but you can get different effects with different lengths too.

I've read funny books with chapter lengths all over the place. The shortest chapter was two words I think ... and it worked because it was a short story and it made it funnier. Sometimes chapters can be too long to read in my opinion, like sometimes you flick through the pages to see how long it is til the end of a chapter and you just think "Nah, too long, I should be going to bed now," and stop right where you are.

But really, it's anything goes.

It depends. In Holes, the chapters were about half a page long. In Harry Potter, they were about ten pages long (if I remember correctly.) They were both very successful books, so apparently, it doesn't matter too much.

They can be as long or as short as you would like them to be.

Truthfully, my opinion on chapters are this : If a chapter is short, it is short. Just so you know that if you wish for that chapter to be long, you may always extend on it. It is what you want it to be.

I like to have my chapters relatively around the same length...I don't want one chapter to be a page long and then have another chapter thirty pages or something like that o_o I want a happy medium. Granted, some scenes take more pages than others and it really all depends on the effects you want to achieve. Sometimes what helps me on those really short chapters is just to include a break (***) and then combine it with another chapter. But it is all up to you, you're the writer.

Give them as much space, or a lack thereof, as they need. Putting your words on the rack to stretch out the chapter is painful for all involved.

Ok i'm going to give you some good advice. If you make a short chapter it's easier to make a title for the chapter. Longer chapters are harder to make titles cause they have alot of information in them. It really depends on wheither or not you want to make many chapters to explan that chapter better or longer ones to make it harder for the reader to understand thus making it more interesting. It depends on the writer and reader.
That help any????

James Patterson-short. So that your genious will come out in bursts, and not have it fizzle out during long chapters.

:]

I use 25-30 pages, but each chapter being composed of scenes. Chapters are often set by time, place or mood change. I will begin a fight at the start of a chapter and let the conversation be done on the end of the last chapter. Of course my fights and stuff in fantasy are usually five pages long for even a quick exchange of moves... I think a fight barely lasting a minute or two took five pages. Then again I've been known to blow an entire chapter to a fight then use the next chapter as the aftermath.

Anyways... you want rising action at the end of a chapter for the most part. Something to make the reader continue on even after the fight scene. A chapter that ends in a fight seen is like the conclusion is going to come next. Or that they will endure a lot of talking or more traveling before things spark up again.

If you are guilty of this, know how to fix it. Chapter structure is not an art, but don't do lame cliffhangers and don't end the chapter without something wanting to draw the reader on. If its a change in point of view, then have something leaving the last chapter to continue things on and tell the reader there is more to come.

Flow and use that rising action to build everything up higher and higher as you progress through the story and chapters should help carry this smoothly along as well.

It should be measured in periods, not words or pages. Have a chapter for every important thing that happens. You'll get the hang eventually.

Don't think of a chapter as a certain number of words or pages. Stop a chapter when you need to move on to another scene, skip forward by a certain amount of time or want a cliffhanger.

I once read a series of books which told the stories from several points of view (Noughts and Crosses/Knife Edge/Checkmate by Malorie Blackman) and every time the author wanted to change the character she had describing their side of the story, she started a new chapter. All three of those books had over a hundred chapters, I think.