Word Count for Mainstream Fiction ???

Keep cutting. The 'acceptable' range is somewhere between 70-90k. 100k if you stretch it a bit.

Did you change the title of your book too? I still think you should write something else and then have this perfect "finished" book in reserve. I am a fan of writing ahead.

I'd cut a little more.

The word count thing has my throat in a vice too. I performed what I call a slaughterfest on my manuscript, and brought it down to a tidy 355000 words. I searched for places to slice it into a series, and it can't be done without scraping out necessary elements. I believe it is doomed to wait for three hundred years, when it will be excavated by great horned owls or some damn thing.
RA

The agent for the book I collaborated on...

won't even begin sending it out until it's no more than 100k. Same mantra: "They won't even look at a first-time author's manuscript unless it's under 100k words."

Ouch. It's being edited, line by line, now with that intent.

I'm not a big fan of "them." LOL

100k...That would be about 28.16 percent of the entire ms. I guess for lack of a better term, this ms is screwed. I went through all 9 of my ms, and find that only three are anywhere near that number. Only one is under 100k, the other two are 145k and 181k.
Geez, someone take away the calculator on desktop!
RA

Well shiat. The way you put that MM, makes my gut sorta enlarge. This particular work was in progress for six years, editing for three. Damn it, but I think I need a drink. It's not that I can't edit, I just don't want to bugger it up. It's bloody well perfect as it is, I just have to find a reasonable readfreak editor to sop it up into their title list!
RA

I'll piggyback here with my word count question....

Does an appendix count toward the total word count for a novel? I can't find a definitive answer to that question.

Thanks!

What about self publishing it? Just for self for yourself to see how that goes... Like through LuLu and just write something else?

355,000 words? Goodness, I'm trying to make my 51,000word manuscript grow up to 70,000, I can't imagine ever being able to write that much! Too bad you can't find a way to cut it up into smaller pieces, it seems a shame to waste so many words! lol.

My first 'epic' was a bloated 235K. If I were so inclined (which I am not at the moment) I could easily half that with everything I've learned the last three years.

I'm lurking. But I have to say: As hard as it is to cut; it's harder not to sell! Thank you very much....

DON'T CUT!! If it took 6 years to write, and you're cutting 2/3 of it- thats 4 years of your life you're looking to cut! Argh.... that's frustrating

Can you write another nove instead? 100k limit is for FIRST time authors, right? SO...write a 100k novel, then try submitting this one again..just a thought. Why mess with perfection anyways? It won't be half the novel (literally) it is now...

Lainey Bancroft said:

My first 'epic' was a bloated 235K. If I were so inclined (which I am not at the moment) I could easily half that with everything I've learned the last three years.

Click to expand...

How long did it take to write and polish?

"The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant" is a triple trilogy. 3 x 3 volume sets. 9 books.
All were over 500 pages and I bought everyone. I have no idea what each word count was or the total, but if you wrote a worthy 355k or 235k words, then chop nothing, look to make them into 90-100k word series.
If you can't or won't try to sell that as unpublished authors, then write the 80-100k #2 and call it #1 and publish that b4 you publish your original work.
My #1 is 114k, too many words they said. #2 is 84k, and interchangeable as to what you read first. #3 is 104k and needs to have knowledge and scene setting from #1 or #2, preferably both, from my POV anyways!

can you cut several stories from it that can stand alone or be read as a series? just a thought.

I agree with Ms.Rachel. Could you turn it into a series. It's just something to think about. Good luck.
Jane

"Thomas Covenant" is not mainstream, it's fantasy. Word counts for fantasy can run up to 120K for first time authors and well over 150K for proven authors.

A first time mainstream novel should land around 100K.

Here's a link to a blog Colleen Lindsay, Agent with FinePrint Literary, did on word counts. Matches up well to everything else I've seen.

http://theswivet.blogspot.com/2008/03/on-word-counts-and-novel-length.html

Whenever I hear about word counts that go way over accepted guidelines, I wonder about story structure and tightness. Maybe putting those works aside until you can look at them with an objective (and hopefully less emotionally attached) eye could help. We all have to kill some of our darlings! Best of luck.

I think perhaps shelving the larger work for now might not be a bad thing. Sure, if you can stand cutting it and you feel that it would be the best introduction of you as a writer to the world, then go ahead. Often I hear other writers saying that hacking apart a manuscript is very cathartic and enriching work.

However, it might not be so bad to really sit down and pound out a shorter work. I know made that sound like it was something to do between go to the grocery store and build an addition on your house completely by yourself. Of course, I may also feel this way because I find it difficult to self-edit.

I wonder how many authors had their first works published? I mean isn't it usually like the third or fourth novel one writes before you get published? So write those other, shorter books. Then you can sell those older works and the same people who shit on them before will call them "unvarnished, raw, and exciting." Again these are the same people who would see how long your "first novel" is and send it back probably unread.

Good luck. Let us know how this turns out!

JrFFKacy said:

355,000 words? Goodness, I'm trying to make my 51,000word manuscript grow up to 70,000, I can't imagine ever being able to write that much! Too bad you can't find a way to cut it up into smaller pieces, it seems a shame to waste so many words! lol.

Click to expand...

Ir's a shame there isn't a way for the 'overwriters' to donate their excess words to the 'underwriters'.