In a recent Ask the Editor post, Kathy Stemke as ked how a writer decides where to place chapter breaks. In fiction, chaptering is often intuitive. The practice isn't even as old as long-form fiction—it began in Great Britain so parts of books could be published in serial form. Chaptering may feel arbitrary at first, but here's what you can gain from the exercise. 1. Chapter breaks remind you that story structure is important. Unless you plan to create numbered "books" or other multi-chapter sections within your novel, the chapter will probably be its largest building block. Building blocks make you think of structural elements like scene goals and conflict relevant to those goals, which is a good thing. 2. Chapter breaks remind you to think in terms of scenes. Chapters may have been revolutionary in Dickens' day but the modern reader is well adapted to sound bytes and jump cuts. We are busy. We want you to get to the good part. Whether your chapter in...

Nicole Langan asks: "What are some helpful tips on how an author can train their own editing eye even when they've read their own work a million times?" Kathryn Craft replies: When looking at my own work for the umpteenth time, here’s the problem I run into: no matter how steely my intentions for self-editing, I am immediately caught up, once again, in my protagonist’s plight. I may have started out looking for continuity issues ( Continuity issues! Continuity issues! ), but by page four or five I am seduced once again by the story’s central drama. Sound familiar? The way to counter this is to engage your inner critic while simultaneously disrupting your reading response. To do this I find it imperative that I not read my story through in order. Your word processor’s “find” function can help you by targeting select issues while keeping you out of the intention-bending mire of your own prose. When the word processor plunks you down on a new page, address the issue ...