Novel episode length - should I cut back?

[smilingworg]

I know the suggested length for novel episodes given by Tapas is to stay around 1000.
For the first twenty episodes, I stuck to that average pretty well. Then I noticed for 21-30, I was starting to creep into the 1200 range. Now for 31-43, I've noticed I'm leaning toward the 1300 range, with some going over 1400 or even 1500.
I'm wondering if longer episodes is a problem for readers. I tell myself that anyone who's gotten past episode 20 is a dedicated reader and wants more content per week, especially if they're reading as I publish.
So, should I cut back?
I can give a link if people need context

[Ordinaryaverageguy]

It seems hard, to me anyway, to find reasonable places to chop a story up into bites of such consistently small sizes. Doing so seems to force an author to end an episode in the middle of an important scene, or do contrive to make every scene small to begin with.
I'm for sure no example of how to be a "Tapas Winner" but it seemed necessary to mostlylet my story flow dictate episode lengths. There were a few times, though, that I had to bite the bullet hard & find a way to split a long chapter.

[caedestyles]

As a reader I wouldn't mind 1,500 words at all, especially later on when I'm already invested. If you wanted to keep them shorter, I'd check if there's a decent "cliffhanger" around 1,000 words that you can use as a cutoff point instead, but I wouldn't force it if the length and pacing suits the story better.

[smilingworg]

Thanks all. I think for now I'll stick with the episodes I've written, but still do my best to get down to the 1000 again with newer episodes. Or at the very least, 1200-1300.

[tiff524]

My episodes average between 1200 to 1500 words. I think that is a good size for an episode. And it is hard to end any episode sooner if you are in an important scene. A lot of the time, you have to go with your gut. But ending on an important cliffhanger moment is important. That's where I tended to end an episode so people keep reading. Best of luck!

[moontokkym]

I think you're pretty fine, remember that 100-150 words is only a small paragraph. You're fretting this much about adding half a page for a pocket-sized edition. 1500 words is by no means a long chapter and if your writing is good and you're cutting at the best times for the narrative, people won't notice.

Remember as well that this cutting up is almost exclusively to allow you to post multiple times per week for contemporary readers, most of your readership will be in a position to binge at least a portion of your work, and they'll be reading possibly tens of thousands of words in one sitting.