Novel length

[cleoauthor]

Are publishers more concerned about page count or word count?

Thanks,
Cleoauthor

[arainsb123]

Definitely word count, from everything I've been told.

[mr mistook]

How long is too long for a novel? How short is too short? This thing I'm working on is beginning to look like 600 pages. Maybe after revisions I can boil it down to 500.

Also... I'm writing in MS Word. Can I safely assume that a "word" page is roughly equivalent to a published book-page?

[macalicious731]

Mistook, when it comes to pages you'll also want to look at word count.

Here's a link that might help you out, from some board members here: Word Count (http://p197.ezboard.com/fabsolutewritefrm11.showMessage?topicID=434.topic)

[veingloree]

Given that page count depends on font, size, spacing and whether its US or UK A4, best to stick with wordcount.

[HConn]

Cleo, look up the websites of a couple publishers who put out books like the ones you are writing. If they have submission guidelines, check out their recommended word lengths.

That should give you a general idea.

[Jamesaritchie]

Depending on font and margins, and on genre,600 pages isn't unreasonable for a number of publishers.

But how short or how long always depends on what a paerticular publisher wants for a particular line of books.

[Writing Again]

First write the story. Then make it the best story you can. Then deal with length.

[maestrowork]

In Word you can do a word count. It's not precise but at least gives you an idea. Better yet, use the non-space character count, divide that by 6.

Your novel should fall between 50,000 to 120,000 words (for a first novel anyway). The longer your work, the harder it is to sell to a prospective publisher.

[HConn]

Maestro, a slightly more accurate wordcount is to add the character count and the word count together, then divide by six. Then you'll be counting spaces, too.

Speaking roughly, of course.

[maestrowork]

But Word also count characters including spaces...

[macalicious731]

Word has a couple of options:

Words
Characters (no spaces)
Characters (with spaces)

The link I posted above already lists a couple different ways to calculate an accuarate count using these three options.

[HConn]

I use Word 6.0. It doesn't count spaces and it doesn't offer options.

[Jules Hall]

I always prefer to work based on an estimate of words per page. It's so much easier than fiddling about trying to get a "proper" count out of a word processor.

The way I did it: take a sample of your writing, a few thousand words, and copy and paste it into a new document. Format it as you would a normal manuscript (e.g., Courier New, 11pt, double space, 3cm margins, 3cm first-line indent on A4 for me). Then join everything together into a single paragraph. Once you've done that, delete everything on the last page. Now use the word processor's count to get the actual number of words (or use the character count and divide by 6 as suggested above, if you feel this is better). Divide by the number of full pages you have, and that's your number of words per page. For me, it's 275. From this point on, work in terms of complete pages.

The advantage to this approach is it takes into account the volume of whitespace in your manuscript, as well as the number of words, which helps estimate the eventual length of your book. The number of pages in the book is the important thing, to everyone concerned, but to work it out, you'll need to know both your number of words per page and the same figure for a book printed in the style yours will be. I've looked at a few standard paperback books, and most have between 300 and 400 words per page, so will have slightly fewer pages than you have manuscript pages (assuming your format is similar to mine; if you use Times New Roman as your font, for example, you may get substantially more words per page than me)

[maestrowork]

Some editors use the 250 words per page as a standard, as long as the ms. is formatted correctly (courier 12, double spaced, etc.)

[Jamesaritchie]

One inch margins all around, Courier 12, double-spaced, is 250 words, no matter what your word processor tells you. From the SFWA website www.sfwa.org/writing/wordcount.htm (http://www.sfwa.org/writing/wordcount.htm)

In a novel length manuscript, you just have to be reasonably close on word count, but it makes it a heck of a lot easier on copyeditor, and many regular editors, if you use the 250 words per page rule.

As they say, "Ink is cheap, paper is expensive."

Editors care about word count in manuscripts, but only because it's easier than trying to explain page count with all teh variables. If all writers used the same font and the same margins, page count would be the easiest way.

What publishers care about is how many pages the published novel will be. It takes a lot of money to buy that paper, so what they really want is word count done in such a way they can tell at a glance how much paper they'll have to buy to actually publish the novel.

[arainsb123]

I use 1-inch margins and 12-point courier. My manuscript has 163 pages in that format, which would be 40,750 words according to the 250 words per page method. However, the word count according to my word processor is a little less than 34,000. Which one should I use?

[HConn]

Use the answer that best suits your needs at the moment.

[arainsb123]

"Use the answer that best suits your needs at the moment."

That's kinda vague. 40,000 would obviously suit my needs better, but do editors prefer that?

[macalicious731]

but do editors prefer that?

Depends on the editor. Check their sub. requirements and see if they say anything about how they would like you do calculate word count, or if a "lower" count would suit you there better. (Editor is known for printing shorter work, longer, etc..)

[maestrowork]

I think what HConn meant was kind of...

If the editor expects something 60K and your actually word count is only 55K, it might be good to "up it" by using the 250 word/page method -- it's going to give you more words... and vice versa.

Or something like that. :-)

[HConn]

There are a lot of ways to calculate word counts. Do all of them. Each only takes a minute. Then use the result that suits your needs.

Choose the highest result, the lowest result, whatever. It's not cheating, exactly....

[arainsb123]

That's good. 40,000 words is a lot more appealing than 34K.

[jpstewar]

Greetings. I'm new to this forum and have a question about word count. Till I read this thread yesterday, I thought for sure I had a 69,000 word novel. I guess I'm the last guy on the block to realize that the word count in Microsoft Word is unreliable. Or at least that it's not the one you'd take as gospel to send to a prospective agent or publisher.

But the information I've read here - while informative - still leaves me somewhat confused. I get two different numbers based on how I do the calculation. If I do the word count option, here's what I get:

Pages: 129
Words: 69447
Characters (no spaces): 289,060
Characters (with spaces): 358,110
Paragraphs: 1927
Lines: 5387

Based on some of what I've seen on this forum, I'd think the actual word count is closer to 60k. (Dividing characters w/spaces by 6). But based on someone suggesting a calculation involving average characters per line – which I hand counted to be at approx. 74 based on the first ten lines - the number could be closer to 69,000.

Not sure how best to calculate this at this point. It’s crucial because I am quite near to having a final read-through by someone and then – barring any radical surgery – submitting it to a literary agent.

So two questions – what’s the length of this beast? And if it’s 60,000 words, would a publisher go for that or think it’s just too short? (It’s your standard “coming-of-age, semi-autobiographical, first person” thing.) Thanks

[James D Macdonald]

Pages: 129
Words: 69447

I'm just guessing, here, but you aren't using double-spaced Courier 10 with one-inch margins, are you?

[jpstewar]

I'm just guessing, here, but you aren't using double-spaced Courier 10 with one-inch margins, are you?

No. Till now, I'd given zero thought to any publishing considerations. The manuscript is single-spaced Times New Roman 12, with with one-inch margins top and bottom, 1.25 left and right.

[Jamesaritchie]

Courier 12 with one inch margins and 25 lines per page is simply counted as 250 words per page.

The trouble with a word processor count is that it counts "I," "a," "The," an." etc., as one word, but it also counts "encyclopedia" as one word. Obviously, it takes more paper to print the word "encyclopedia" than it does to print shorter words, and it's paper that makes it costly to publish a novel, not ink.

If you want to get an exact count by hand, count the spaces in a full line. All the spaces, then divide by six, and multiply by how many lines there are on the page. Now multiply this by the number of pages in the novel.

If you set margins so you get sixty spaces per line, easy to do with Courier 12, this gives you ten words per line, regardless of what your word count program says. Half lines and half pages count as full pages because they still take the same amount of paper in the published book.

The main advantage of this is that it can save some nasty surprises after you sell a novel. Editors often buy novels, and then, during the editing process, ask the writer for drastic cuts. An exact word count that places the novel at the length a publisher asks for usually stops this from happening.

And remember that everything needs to be double spaced. Editors won't even look at a manuscript that is single spaced. It makes for more difficult reading, but primarily, it makes editing far too difficult. There must be space between lines for editors to write in, and space between words and letters for editors to insert proofreader marks.

In truth, a word count program will sometimes get you close enough, depending on writing style, but it can also be many thousands of words off on occasion, so it's best not to take the chance.

The easiest and most accurate way is to simply use Courier 12, one inch margins, 25 lines per page, and count every page as 250 words. Even if you aren't getting exactly 60 spaces per line this way, you'll be so close that the difference won't matter.

As for what sells, most publishers want 80,000-120,000 words, depending on the particular line of books. It's very difficult to sell anything under 70,000 words, and for a new writer, very difficult to sell anything over 120,000 words. And once a new writer passes 150,000 words, many agents and editors just don't want to see it.

But again, you always have to check length requirements from individual publishers for the exact line of books your novel will go to.

[cherilnc]

a novel is between 60,000 - 80,000 ( more is okay but harder to push and less is a novella)

[jpstewar]

Well, thanks for the tips. If I convert the doc to Courier, change the margins and do the calculations, I come up with 75,000 words. Not bad, I guess. Maybe I'll send a query out saying it's, oh, 72,000 words. If a literary agent actually *likes* it but wants more, I'll add a prologue, a coda, my recipe for chicken coq au vin and a car chase. That outta do it.

[Jamesaritchie]

"a novel is between 60,000 - 80,000 ( more is okay but harder to push and less is a novella) "

Actually, in literary circles, a novella is from 15,000-30,000 words, and anything over this is a novel. In SF circles, a novella is 17,500-40,000 words, and anything over 40K is a novel.

80,000 is actually at the low end of what most publishers want for a novel. Average length of a novel is 100,000 words. The range most publishers want is 80,000-120,000 words.

Standard lengths for fiction are:

Short short--under 2,000 words.
Short Story--2,000 to 7,500 words.
Novelette--7,500 to 17,500 words.
Novella--17,500 to 40,000 words.
Novel-- anything over 40,000 words.

But if you want to sell a first novel, odds are very high it will have to be between 80,000 and 120,000 words. Under 80K is tough to sell, and over 120K is tough to sell, if you're a new writer. But a 100K novel will fit the majority of book lines out there perfectly.

[James D Macdonald]

Under 80K is tough to sell, and over 120K is tough to sell...

Novel lengths fit under a bell curve. The closer you get to the edges, the more brilliant your book has to be.

[Writing Again]

So a good guess would be that my WIP weighing in from 150,000 to 180,000 will be a bit outside the curve.

Now if I were just brilliant...

[maestrowork]

Using the Word word count my novel is about 72000. Using the 250 word/page method it's about 89000. So I guess it's either within curve or "brilliant" depending how you look at it... :grin

[katdad]

"I use 1-inch margins and 12-point courier. My manuscript has 163 pages in that format, which would be 40,750 words according to the 250 words per page method. However, the word count according to my word processor is a little less than 34,000. Which one should I use?"

Regardless of idiosyncracies, I'd say the automatic word count is more accurate. The other is an estimate at best.

Either way, your novel is too short. It needs to be about 65,000 words minimum for any decent chance at publication. (This implies the normal route for publication, agenting or whatever, conventional print publisher).