: Re: Is it OK to add chapters to slow down the pace of the story? Example: I'm writing a story where the protagonist is searching for some information. She searches for it at her university, and

@Annie587

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Short answer: Yes.

Suppose you set out to write, say, a murder mystery. And your complete first draft was: "Sally Jones was found dead in an alley. A detective came to investigate. He found several important clues and realized that the murderer must be her boyfriend, Albert Fromme. The police arrested Fromme and he was convicted and sent to jail. The End." Well, that would be a pretty boring story because it goes way to fast and has way too little detail.
@PublicWireless says that you shouldn't add chapters just to "slow a story down" and that's true in a sense. Of course you don't want the reader to perceive the story as "slow". You want the reader to perceive the story as "building tension", "presenting many interesting facts", etc.

There are, I think, basically three ways to make a story longer other than just adding pointless material to waste time.

One: Add additional obstacles for the hero to overcome. In a mystery story, this could be false leads. In an action story, this could be additional opponents that the hero must fight along the way. In a romance, it could be a competing lover. Etc.

Two: Add character development or background. Tell us more about who the characters are and how they got to be this way. Or give additional detail about their environment. Like in a science fiction story, tell us about this planet.

Three: Add a counter-plot. If you have a plot that you think makes an interesting story but it's just too short and you don't see how to make it longer without sounding like you were just throwing in junk to make it longer, then make another story and intertwine the two. A really common thing done here is to throw in a romance. Like if the basic story is about, say, a man searching for lost treasure, you throw a female character in at some point, and as he's searching for the treasure he falls in love with this woman and you go back and forth between the treasure-hunting story and the romance story. They may have nothing to do with each other per se, other than both stories involving the same characters, though the more you can tie them together the better.

As with many things in writing, if you do this well, you get your story to the desired length, the reader considers it a satisfying experience, and hooray. If you do it poorly, the reader says, "Oh man, this book just keeps throwing in stupid irrelevant events just to waste time!"

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