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Comedy·BOOKS

Get ready to binge read! Author to release every chapter of new novel all at once

For decades – centuries even – novels have been published and read the same way. Each chapter is distributed at the same, set time every week, say, Wednesdays at 8:30 p.m.
Brian Boone · CBC Comedy ·
(Shutterstock / Dean Drobot)

TORONTO, ON—For decades – centuries even – novels have been published and read the same way. Each chapter is distributed at the same, set time every week, say, Wednesdays at 8:30 p.m. If readers were enthralled by that chapter and wanted to read more, well, they just had to wait a week until the next chapter was released.

Until now.

Bestselling author Melody Beal's new novel Grace Pritchett is a coming-of-age story about a teenager in 1880s London. It's earning rave reviews, but what's truly exceptional about the novel is how publisher Brighton Books is delivering it to readers.

Rather than release one chapter each week of the book season, all of Grace Pritchett will be available at the same time. That means that once readers finish Chapter One and are dying to see what happens next…they can simply turn the page and start in on Chapter Two. Immediately.

"I've always hated how I get really into a book and I have to wait a week for the next chapter," Beal explains. "Or worse—over the entire summer if the last chapter was a cliffhanger."

Beal conceived the idea one day early in the writing process when she was experiencing "writer's block" and wound up watching an entire season of Parks and Recreation on Netflix in one sitting. Beal wondered if the innovative concept could be applied to books. She asked her agent, who said the technology didn't exist, and to not bother the publisher with such a silly idea. Instead, Beal directly approached her publisher at Brighton Books, who was very enthusiastic. (Beal then fired her agent.)

"Technology has advanced to the point where we can distribute every chapter of a book all at once, and readers deserve a choice in how they want to read it," says Dominic Murphy, vice president of public relations for Brighton Books. "They can dole it out in small chunks, or they can burn through the whole thing all at once on a lazy Saturday. It's something we like to call 'binge reading.'"

If the format pioneered by Grace Pritchett takes off, it could even change some familiar novel conventions. For example, because Brighton assumes readers will absorb large swaths of Grace Pritchett at once, Beal didn't have to include those brief and ubiquitous "In the last chapter of…" summaries that generally introduce new chapters. Grace Pritchett also has a special setting that automatically skips the credits when the next chapter begins. The reader doesn't need to be reminded of the name of the book and its author—the story continues along with almost no break in the action at all.

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