First book and I’m worried my book is (and I’m being) too ambitious
I’m writing my first ever book and it’s like an epic fantasy romance. My current outline is around 150k words and was originally 40 chapters, but I’m considering shortening it to around 32–35 because I don’t want to drag out the story just to hit a chapter count. The plot is mystery-driven with a slow-burn romance, and every chapter advances either the mystery or the relationship. My concern is that I’m rushing through time because the first half of the story only spans a few weeks. For those who’ve written or published fantasy: is it better to compress time and keep the pacing tight, or spend more chapters showing day-to-day life? I’d rather have a book readers can’t put down than one that feels padded. I’m also worried about a lot of other things. Like my pacing sucks. I feel like sometimes I can be dragging on and right now I’m stuck on how to do a transition without boom time skip. Which is also a problem for me because I’m not the best at the whole time passing thing. It’s my first time trying to write a book and genuinely hoping to finish it. Yet I’m anxious as well as excited. I’ve had a few people read what I have so far and they’ve really enjoyed it but they’re my friends so I’m not sure if it’s biased or genuine. Then I’ve done some edits which only shortened the whole thing as well as make it feel even worse than it did before. I haven’t technically written in days because I’m so stuck in this way I don’t know how to explain. Im not sure what to do. Any advice?