Chapter Book Guidelines

I like writing children’s chapter books. They allow the writer more freedom than picture books or early readers, but they’re not as involved as middle-grade or young adult books.

The children’s chapter book is just right—at least to me.

I’m currently working in three different genres: picture book, chapter book, and a young adult. And, there’s also my own middle-grade story which, I’ve had to put on the back burner for the time being.

Working in multiple genres, I know what’s involved in each and as I mentioned in the first sentence, I like chapter books best. Picture books are a close second, though.

HOW DOES THE CHILDREN’S CHAPTER BOOK COMPARE TO OTHER GENRES?

Chapter Books vs. Picture Books

I prefer chapter books over picture books because you have more words to work with. A good length for a chapter book is 10,000 words, but it can be from under 5,000 to around 15,000 words.

That amount of words gives the writer the freedom to provide details, descriptions, and so on, that you just can’t do in a picture book as the picture book should be well under 800 words. And that word count keeps shrinking. Hopefully, one day it’ll go back up to around 1,000.

You need to write tight with picture books in order to get a full story arc.

Chapter Book vs. Early Reader

Compared to the early reader, chapter books, again, allow for a lot more freedom. While you do have to consider the age of the reader for the plot, sentence structure, paragraphs, and so on with the chapter book, it’s not as stringent as the early reader.

The early reader is geared toward the emergent reader. The words, sentences, and paragraphs have to be in accordance with educational tools like the Lexile Framework for Reading.

Chapter Books vs. Middle Grade and Young Adult

The other great thing about chapter books is they’re not as involved as the middle grade or young adult.

A middle-grade book is usually anywhere from 20,000 (for a simple middle grade) to 55,000 (for upper middle grade).

The young adult books are usually 55,000 up to 80,000 words. This kind of word count calls for a lot of organization and a lot of notes. And a good memory helps, too.

While a larger word count allows for a much more in-depth story with lots and lots of details, including subplots, and even more than one point of view, there’s a lot to keep track of.

To add to this, if you’re working with a client, you may encounter pauses in the writing momentum due to the client taking a long time to review what you send. This is a big deal when you’ve got a good momentum going and you have to put it on pause.

CHAPTER BOOK GUIDELINES

So, What Exactly Are the Guidelines of the Chapter Book?

According to editor Mary Kole, the chapter book’s key element is for the reader to have “easy wins.” This means the new reader will get a sense of accomplishment for each chapter he reads. This is a huge win for a child just learning to read.

Reader Age

This age group varies, but the usual is seven to nine.

Word Count, Pages, and Chapter Length

As mentioned earlier, the word count can be 5,000 to 15,000, but the sweet spot is around 10,000. And the book can have 48-80 pages.

Because the child is new to reading independently, the chapters should be 500-700 words. Short and sweet. This helps with the ‘easy wins.’

Along with having easy wins, shorter chapters allow the young reader to pause or stop reading at the end of a chapter. This makes reading less tiresome.

Considering the word count per chapter, having 10-20 chapters is a good amount.

Plot

The plot should be simple, and subplots should be avoided.

The young reader is just beginning to get comfortable reading on his own. Making the story easy to understand and follow along is essential.

The book should have a full story (narrative) arc.

Popular topics include friendship, inclusion, school, bullying, being yourself, and achieving goals. The topics need to be relatable to kids in grammar school.

Words

Word choice should be age-appropriate. And keep in mind that the characters should sound like ‘real’ kids.

For example, if a character refuses to do something, how would he say it?

“I’d rather not do that.” Or “No way!”

If you don’t have personal access to kids, watch age-related shows and read lots of chapter books.

Sentence Structure

Sentences should be short, around 12-20 words. The average sentence length in J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter is 12.

Vary the length, and you can use some sentence fragments. The “No way!” from above is a sentence fragment.

You can also use onomatopoeia sound words. These are words that sound like the action that’s happening: plop, zap, buzz, boom, clank, achoo…

Story timeframe

The timeframe for the story should be short.

For simpler chapter books, it should be limited to one incident. For the longer chapter book, the timeframe could be longer. But not too long – it shouldn’t span years or even one year.

Characters

There should be a full character arc. The protagonist struggles to overcome a problem or obstacle and ‘grows’ in some way as a result of the journey.

The character might become more assertive, wiser, friendlier, happier, accepting, social, helpful, understanding, a better person, better in sports, etc.

The protagonist should be at the top end of the target age group or a little older. So, basing it on the average reader of seven to nine, the protagonist should be nine to ten. Kids don’t like to read down. In other words, they don’t want to read about a protagonist younger than they are.

There should be only one point of view: that of the protagonist.

Illustrations

Kids in this age group are still learning to gather information through text only; having illustrations here and there will be helpful. The beginning of each chapter is a good place or where you want to ‘show’ the reader what’s going on.

Similar to picture books, the illustrations can help tell the story, so physical characteristics don’t need to be mentioned in the text.

You do have the option of having black and white illustrations rather than full color like picture books. In this case, you would mention characteristics in regard to color, such as blonde hair, a purple room, and so on.

This is the basics of a chapter book.

If you’re not familiar with chapter books, a good way to get a feel for them is to take a lot recently traditionally published ones out of the library and study them.

If you’re a children’s writer and haven’t written one yet, give it a try!

References:

(1) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngDXXlVrL1U&feature=youtu.be

https://www.masterclass.com/articles/what-are-the-elements-of-a-narrative-arc-and-how-do-you-create-one-in-writing#quiz-0

I’m a working children’s ghostwriter, editor, and coach. I can help turn your story into a book you’ll be proud to be the author of, one that’s publishable and marketable.

Other help I offer is my guided self-study course and mentoring program, FICTION WRITING FOR CHILDREN.

Or you might want a DIY book, HOW TO WRITE A CHILDREN’S FICTION BOOK.

And finally, if your children’s manuscript is finished and you need help self-publishing, you’ll find what you need at WRITERS ON THE MOVE PRESS.

You can contact me at: kcioffiventrice@gmail.com. Or give me a call at 347—834—6700. (Please leave a message- I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.)