Hi all! I've decided that the domestic abuse piece would work well if written in four parts (part one being the domestic abuse, part two the court and hospital, part three the prison and part four the coming back into society) My question is how many chapters are ideally in a novel? And what is the ideal word count for each chapter? Any other advice on the four part novel is welcome! Thank you in advance :)
After importing my work-in-progress into Scrivener I discovered that my average chapter length was 2,000–2,500 words. There is of course no correct length, but this was helpful in showing me what my subconsciousness had determined as being right. As my particular genre recommends a total 90,000 word manuscript (according to Writers' Digest), I would therefore need to write 36–45 chapters to complete it. While the editing process will also influence the final number, having a rough number makes it easier to tackle 40 chapters than having no clue at all. I hope this helps!
The question of how long chapters and/or parts in writing for publication should be, is one that I've pondered over in my own projects, but in my opinion it really depends on the present work, which you're undertaking. For me, each chapter/part will pretty much direct the volume of its content during the writing process. I also agree with Malcolm that your initial choice is a good platform to start from, but each subject matter will either surpass or fall short of what is considered the average number of pages by how much of it is necessary to the story.
Vicky,
How long is a piece of string? I think you've made a good start deciding that your book falls into four parts. It's up to you how much goes in each part. Some may have more chapters if there is more drama or tension, or may easily fall into fewer shorter chapters. I don't think there is a magic formula. You know your story best, and its a question of how much you think goes in each part and it's relevance to the overall story.