you can’t just cut your big book in half
my name is Gina I’m an author editor
publishing professional I help you make your writing better
anytime I talk a while word counts
I inevitably get somebody that’s like
I wrote a book that’s like 250,000 words
I’m just gonna chop it in half and have it be two books that are the right size
great that doesn’t work
because if you are cutting a book in half
then that means that you have cut the book at the midpoint
which means that there is not a satisfying resolution
that means that there is not a character arc
it means that there is not a complete story
and the pacing is all kinds of off and wrong
and that’s gonna go for both books
in that supposed duology that now your new book is gonna be starting
like
in the middle of a place where there’s not gonna be a new inciting incident
there’s not a new character arc
we’ve got you know
like 20% of the book before anything new actually happens
like you’re going to have some really
really funky and like to the point where it’s like off putting in
audiences do not enjoy it
pacing problems I have read a lot of really long pre published books in my life
like a a lot of them
fantasy and science fiction is my go to genre
and historical fiction is my secondary genre
and so these are genres that tend to run long
and these are genres in which the people who write them
really love the world building
and all of the stuff that goes along with it
so they tend to write really long books
I have no shortage of 300,000 word manuscripts on my hard drive
I have read a lot of these really long pre published books
and would you like to know how many times I have recommended to somebody
that they chop it in half
zero none
zero times because that has never been the obvious solution
the solution is always in making cuts
almost always at the beginning
because these authors will spend just chapter upon chapter upon chapter
of exploring political backstory and family dynamics
and world building and magic systems
sometimes we are talking about cutting like 16 30
40,000 words just straight off the beginning
we will be in chapter 17
before we have actually found the beginning of that book
that writing isn’t wasted
all of that stuff was important
and it informs the way the characters move through the world
and it makes the world feel much more consistent
so the author needed to spend that time writing it
it just isn’t going to end up in the final product
but no chopping the book in half is almost never going to be the solution
you’re gonna get away with this
if you are a Brandon Sanderson type
and you are already selling millions of copies of books
because the audience trusts you
if you just chop a book in half and say
well the second half is coming later
they trust you they know that you’re gonna be able to deliver
they know that the story arc is there
notice that the first time the MCU did this was on film
like 19 and 20 in their series
they didn’t do this to you
even though there were a lot of sequels
even though there’s a big
long running story arc
they didn’t film a five hour movie and chop it in half until like
No. 19 and even within that
the second movie in that series
the so this is the Endgame series
like The Infinity War and Endgame
the endgame still has a movie structure to it
they didn’t start immediately when that dust cut
they instead started a new story
and they gave you a pacing of a normal film and a normal story
so chopping the book in half is almost always not going to be the answer
instead if you’ve got a big
long book you have two choices
one you can shelve it until later in your career
knowing that that’s when you’re going to be given the trust of the audience
to write a big fat book
or 2 you’re gonna have to make some deep cuts
they’re gonna feel painful at first
but the book is going to be better for it