Chapterizing

[Bebop3]

Just looking for quick opinions here.

I have a story that will be going in Romance that's just a tad over 35,000 words. It wasn't written to be in chapters, but I can split it in two pretty easily.

Would I be better off having one 11 page (or so) story or two more easily digestible chapters? (again, there's no right or wrong answer here, just looking for rough opinions)


If I do split it in two, how long should I wait between publishing part one and part two? It's done and ready to go, so I have the luxury of publishing one right after the other or waiting a week or, whatever.

Thanks!

 

[John988]

Is it 11 pages as displayed on Lit? If so, I would definitely split it into multiple chapters. The best long stories that I've read on here have been in chapters of moderate length--usually around 4-5 pages--and split into as many chapters as are needed for that length. If you do that, I would publish them all at once so that, if people want to binge the story/series, they can, and they won't forget about it while waiting for each chapter to be released.

If you think that the story would be diminished by dividing it up, though, leave it as one long story. You may lose some readers because of it, but those who are ok with that length will probably enjoy it more.

At the end of the day, it's a question of priorities: get a lot of votes and views, or put out the best content you can.

 

[LoquiSordidaAdMe]

Personally, I'd find an 11 page story intimidating. I've read longer on Literotica, but they were by authors I had read before and I knew would satisfy me. If I dont know your work, I'm a lot more likely to commit to a five page first chapter. That's just me though.

 

[SamScribble]

Thirty-five thousand words is a long short story by anyone's measure. If it won't break into convenient parts (I prefer to think of parts rather than chapters), have you considered posting it as a novella? Just a thought.

Good luck.

 

[SimonDoom]

The average Lit page is 3750 words, so a 35,000 word story is on average 9.33 Lit pages.

That's a moderately long story for this site, and some people won't read it. But if you look at the stats you'll see that long stories often do very well here, both in views and scores.

You should publish it as a single story unless you have a good reason to break it up and publish it in smaller chapters. If it breaks easily into chapters and if each of the chapters contains the stuff that will keep Romance readers happy, then that's fine. But if not, publish it as a single complete story.

If you choose to publish it in chapters, then post the second chapter as soon as the first chapter is published. That way they'll be about 4-5 days apart, and the second one will publish at about the time the first one is nearing the end of its run on the new story list.

 

[TxRad]

As someone who has posted a good number of stories to Romance over 10 pages, I can tell you it will be read and if it is any good, it will have good scores.

I've seen more than one story messed up trying to break it into sections.

 

[Handley_Page]

I'd suggest two parts, published together

 

[ElectricBlue]

Would I be better off having one 11 page (or so) story or two more easily digestible chapters? (again, there's no right or wrong answer here, just looking for rough opinions)

If it's self-contained and resolves itself, I'd put it out as one story. Eleven pages is long, but not that long.

 

[Kojak01]

I'd break it up. Just like John988 I prefer two 5 pagers to one 10 pager.

When I publish chapters I try to submit the next chapter once the previous has been published. That gives you two or three days in between, as long as there are no problems with the LE guidelines.

 

[Gentleman_G]

I don't really care, but 35.000 words is somewhere about the minimum size I consider reading. Then again, I might be an exception to the majority of readers

Having said that, there is something to say for 4-5 pages that makes it easier accessible, so in retrospect that would be my choice for it.

The one thing you might take into consideration is that your first chapter will get the most readers/votes, but because of the exposure to a broader audience it might also get the lowest score out of your two chapters. Simply because people that did not like your first chapter will not read and vote on your second one.

Of course, there are some titles out there that still have very high ratings despite it being done in a single story without chapters - probably because the only people reading it like long stories. For instance, Threads - The Island, which spans 47 pages in a single chapter. But I guess that's an exception by itself.