A client has me thinking about chapters.
Chapters can feel essayistic (coving a topic) or episodic (covering an event). Some writers care most about their length.
I consider their shape & how they make patterns & how the breaks influence a reader's experience.
They're kind of arbitrary like paragraphs--which is fun.
How do you think about chapters?
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Love that you're bringing up scenes within chapters. Some seem to think a scene break necessarily means a chapter should break, but of course they are separate units. Then it comes down to thinking of how to group them inside chapters.
So this is making me think about how I sometimes change the order of scenes to make the chapters feel more shapely. The trouble is--or I guess it's actually a blessing--realizing I CAN move the chapters around so inconsequentially often teaches me that some of those scenes ought to be cut.
@allisonwyss Yep. For me it's mostly shifting one or two scenes earlier or later to ensure that cliffhanger*. Only rarely to even out the chapter lengths. I don't really give that any attention, beyond the visible effect overlong chapters have on my progress tracking chart.
*I know this works. More than half my reviews are of the "couldn't put it down" variety.
Ah! But sometimes I WANT to find a good moment to put a book down!
Allison Wyss
John Beresford