BlueLucario

I'm on chapter one, and i've been working on it for a month and still havent finished it. Many writers have alrady finsihed it in a week.

I've written 7 pages of the chapter, is that too long?

geminye

It really depends on what kind of story you are writing, and how long the book will be.
Generally, readers will prefer the chapters to be somewhat evenly spaced, and each chapter should more or less have a feeling of continuity. S King writes his almost like a short story, leaving a cliff hanger at the end of each to get the reader to turn the page.
You could just finish your story, then break it into chapters during your first of many re-writes. Concentrate on the story, then worry about chapters.

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Suffer the little children...

HarryG

At a very rough average, 12+ pages per chapter, 30+ chapters per a normal sized MS, and a chapter in three to five days, or less, and a million variants in between, especially depending on what you are writing.

Talia_Brie

Those numbers though are very rough. The fact of the matter is I read a book once that had a chapter with two words in it "Pete forgot". Then you have Terry Pratcher who, apparently, often doesn't use chapters at all.

There's no rule, except this, the length of the chapter needs to make sense in the context of what is occurring. You should try to stick to having one thing happen in each chapter, just like a paragraph is supposed to be one idea.

BUt do keep in mind that chapter lengths have a lot to do with pace, and shorter chapters are generally easier to digest, and therefore more attractive to readers.

In terms of how long should it take to write one? I've done a chapter in a couple of hours a few times, sometimes in a couple of days, and occassionally it's taken weeks. There's no rule. Write as quickly or as slowly as you like. I do tend to find, however, that when I'm taking a long time to rite something, the whole story tends to die on me after about 6 months. Stephen King says you should write the first draft very quickly, while the idea is still fresh and hot. More and more I tend to agree with this.

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Erik Buchanan

As for how long it takes to write, there's a story of James Joyce writing seven words in one day, and his friends saying "For you, that's great!"

Different writers work at different paces. The key thing is to keep writing and do it every day.

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ClancyBoy

Stephen King writes long chapters. Misery was about 17 chapters long.
Kurt Vonnegut writes (wrote) very very short chapters, sometimes not even a page. Cat's Cradle has around 70 chapters, but it's still a shorter book than Misery.

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"Mother Hitton's Littul Kittons wait for you down there. Little pets they are, little little little pets. Cute little things, they say. Don't you believe it. No man ever saw them and walked away alive. You won't either. That's the final dash, flash. That's the utter clobber, cobber." --Cordwainer Smith, Norstrillia.

Rabid Euphoria

My first 'chapter of my novel', currently, is 65 pages and it took me about a month to write. My second 'chapter' is 78 pages and took a few weeks to write. Third was 15 pages and took a few days. Fourth is 22 pages and took me a week or so. Fifth is 30 and took me two weeks. Sixth is 32 and took me (block included) three months.

During the second chapter it all flowed so nice I wrote a third of the book in three weeks, doing 3-6 pages 5-7 days a week.


I am considering when I rewrite to chop the first two 'chapters' into a few more parts so they about 40 pages each. My plan, originally, was to have each part show passage of time - starting from night till dawn, second part being dawn until lunch. I still think I've somewhat done that, it looks uneven because of the content in the second half is somewhat different. I do like the names of my chapters though and adds a certain amount of symbolism and irony to the chapters.

1. The Three Musketeers
2. Dawn of Blood
3. A Cheap Lunch at Seven Eleven
4. Excerpts From A Junkie's Journal
5. Fangs in the Dark
6. House of Commons
7. Homestretch

Each of them symbolised specific settings, times and events.


Clancy Boy - You should check out 'The Coma' by Alex Garland. Many of his chapters are only a page and is less than 200 pages long. The short chapters are his stylistic template that makes the book so immersive and wonderful.