What are "chapter books" ?

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Captshady

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I've seen this term flying around a lot lately, and always assumed that it's a book that has chapters, and the only thing NOT a chapter book is a kid's "Rubby bubby tubby guppie" type books. Is there something I'm missing?
 

Cyia

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The school where my mom worked classified early reader books with few illustrations as "chapter" books.
 

Captshady

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The school where my mom worked classified early reader books with few illustrations as "chapter" books.

That's what I figured, but I've seen it used outside of this context quite a bit. I'll start pasting them when I run across it again.
 

Ciera_

When I was a kid (oh, starting when I was probably 6 or so) we called the 'harder' books chapter books. That is, the books whose pages weren't taken up mainly by pictures, and that had big long sections of just...words. For us, saying we read chapter books was like bragging.
Once you get past The Magic Treehouse etc. they're not called chapter books anymore. I'd say that if the people reading it are mainly over ten years of age, and it has no illustrations at all inside, even if it is separated into chapters, then that isn't a chapter book anymore.
Actually, now that I think about, most MG books are probably considered chapter books. Or at least, that's what we called 'em.
Hope my little reminiscence of being six was somewhat helpful. ^.^
 

dpaterso

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I had a novelette published as a "chapbook" a while ago. I believe the term is used to describe a story that has so much background/setting detail that it feels as if it's a standalone excerpt taken from a novel.

-Derek
 

IceCreamEmpress

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"Chapbook" and "chapter book" are not the same thing at all.

A "chapter book" is a short book for children with a mostly-text narrative divided into chapters rather than pictures and text. In general, it's used for books of 2,500 to 15,000 words that are targeted at ages 5 through 8.

A "chapbook" is a limited-edition printing of a short work or collection of short works (short stories, essays, poetry).
 
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