: Re: Benefits of Chapter titles in fictional writing? So, I'm in the process of writing a Sci-fi novel, and I use a website to upload chapters before I complete it. On the website, I use chapter

@Rambettina586

Vote Up Vote Down

I like to use chapter titles while I write, as a minimal outline, to keep track of the sequence of events in the story. Typical chapter titles for me look like:

(1) Boarding the Lifeboat
(2) Saying Goodbye
(3) Party at the Chinese Embassy
(4) Driving Off a Cliff

They work for me as an author, keeping track of my story, but they're terrible for readers, because they summarize the events of the chapter before the reader has a chance to actually read those details for herself.

So when I export my final manuscript, I strongly prefer to just use numerical chapter titles.

But having said that, if my chapter titles were less utilitarian and a bit more poetic, I'd be happy to include them in the final output.

(0)

Login to post a comment!