A Curious Question...

[apollinav]

How do you prefer to organize your chapters?

I ask because my brain is ticking over this.

Chapter 8 of TGC is short. I knew it was short (1,200 words or so) and I didn't care to make it longer, because that would be filling it with fluff. Originally it was merged with the previous 'wedding' chapter, but I separated them. Personally I like my chapters to be organized in 'full and complete thoughts' like one would an essay or dear god, a thesis... (I suck at cliffies for that very reason)

But a keen AFF reviewer challenged my thought process on this. I see her point, it's the same day. And it's good mental chew.

So I pose the eternal question, one that has probably been batted back and forth forevah:

How do you prefer to organize your chapters?

Comments

[miamadwyn.livejournal.com]

I think 'full and complete thoughts' makes sense. There's no one way to do it. (And I haven't read it yet and need to run over there and read it-- the notice that it was up came through in email when I was on my way out the door, and I forgot to go read it when I got back, the agony!)

I had one short chapter in CoMC because it just felt "complete" and that to add anything else to it would diminish it. It was an important moment to me, and I didn't want to detract from it by keeping on writing. I said in the author note that it was short because it felt like there was nothing else to say, and I don't remember for sure, but I don't think anybody complained.

Now, off to read!

Ooops, forgot to say, my early chapters were around 2,000 words each and now they are three times as long, typically, and have been much longer, so things have changed as I've been writing.