Short books are in style

Oh man, I hope so. Novella seems to be my favorite length, after all.

I would have to say yes Trish. All facets of our lives are becoming more and more streamlined; specifically technology and food. People today want everything NOW and it is only a matter of time for books to fall under that umbrella. There isn't enough time to read 1500 pages for the average "Joe". He/She wants to be able to sit down and in a couple of hours, be done with a book.

Is this good or bad? I don't know, but as a writer I don't mind because there is no way I could write anything more than 300 pages!

One of the people I had read my second draft is what we might call a "normal person who reads on occasion." He's in the military and reads most of his books when he either gets deployed to the Big Sandbox, or when he's on temporary duty (TDY to those in the military know) and away from his wife. He told me that he is discouraged from reading books in the genre that appeals to him most (thriller/suspense) because of the size of the books. The average Flynn or Thor ranks in at between 350-400 pages.

He loved my book (yes, he's surely biased) because it's, using the 250 words/page formula, about 250 pages. He said if he saw it on the shelf he'd be more likely to pick it up because it was smaller and he wouldn't get lost or would be able to finish it while on his downtime on assignment.

So yes, I agree...

I expect it depends on the genre and, in some cases, the subgenres. SF/Fantasy/Horror, including the YA offerings, still look fairly hefty to me. Chick lit, on the other hand, looks fairly slim -- probably dieting. Romances in the popular Harlequin/Silhouette lines and the like have always been skinny. Thrillers and mysteries look to be in the middle. Literary and mainstream novels? Middish to thinnish to my taste, these days.

I myself prefer long books, and my natural writing bent is for the long short story and the chunky novel, or novel series. I think it was C. S. Lewis who said he couldn't get a novel too long or a cup of tea too big, and who was proving it at that moment by reading Bleak House and drinking out of an enormous tub of a mug. (If it wasn't C.S., let me know who it was, so I can give him or her a mental shake of the hand.)

Bleak House, yum. Too bad it was so short.

Ideally the length of a book is entirely dependent on the story that needs to be told. Publishers do worry about the price of paper, though, and are widely said to like weight-conscious submissions from all but proven sellers.