What is your take on pacing in books? The obvious example is chapter length. If #malazan is one extreme with long chapters. #Malice and #thesuneaterseries is an other extreme,often with extremely short chapters. Pacing in #writing can be so much more. What is good pacing to you? - ThreadSky

thenostalgicdragon.bsky.social • 99 days ago

What is your take on pacing in books? The obvious example is chapter length. If #malazan is one extreme with long chapters. #Malice and #thesuneaterseries is an other extreme,often with extremely short chapters. Pacing in #writing can be so much more. What is good pacing to you?

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acampbellauthor.bsky.social•99 days ago

I enjoy both styles, as long as it serves the story.

thenostalgicdragon.bsky.social•99 days ago

I think thats fine too😀. But for me a kind of surprise going from the lenghty malazan writing to shorter more fast paced books such as Malice. Shorter chapters can sometimes help to make sure that the reader does not get lost.

acampbellauthor.bsky.social•99 days ago

Yeah, I also think that the shorter chapters help give the read a sense of accomplishment. That they are making progress through the story.

rhetoricalzombi.bsky.social•99 days ago

While I prefer shorter chapters, I don't mind long ones really, so long as it fits the narrative and they aren't filled with just waffle. That being said the chapters in Fahrenheit 451 definitely felt long to me when I read it. While the book was good I was surprised by its chapter length.

thenostalgicdragon.bsky.social•99 days ago

”Waffling” is not good for sure.

writerdgenzlinger.bsky.social•99 days ago

Personally, I love slower paced stories. I'm not sure it has anything to do with chapter length so much as it relates to how much time you give your characters a chance to breathe between the action. @robinhobb.bsky.social has always been the author I give as an example for excellent slow burn reads

thenostalgicdragon.bsky.social•99 days ago

I like your ”breathe” perspective. And maybe on a similar theme as breathe, reader immersion.

ardwulf.bsky.social•98 days ago

I am finding that the long chapters in Malazan (some up to Novella length) can be pretty tiring. I'm also reading Empire of Silence, though, and despite shorter chapters, it's much less compelling.

thenostalgicdragon.bsky.social•97 days ago

Interesting perspective. The middle way is always difficult find.

ardwulf.bsky.social•97 days ago

For Malazan at least, there's a spreadsheet floating around with word counts for each scene and chapter. So I know exactly what I'm getting into when I start a new one. I'd be curious what those numbers are for various generally comparable series.

amberlynng.bsky.social•99 days ago

So I like a combo of both. 5 to 8 pages for a chapter depending the font is fine for me. Longer is for fight scenes. Cliff hanger scenes, and you don't get back to that cliff hanger until 4 chapters later. Things like that.

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