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I think it depends. Stupid answer, but truthful. Just remember while you may find you would skimp on quality if you wrote 3 books a year, there are other authors out there who do not. Each author is an individual. However. Chances are with your genre you would be expected to write only one book a year. It seems to be the norm. Harlequin is a bit different than YA, and especially YA fantasy. Still I maintain that there are authors of every genre who write more or less than you do and the quality varies little.

I could write two YA books of good quality per year if I wrote full time. I'm not sure I could do more than that, but then I should imagine that Harlequin romances follow some kind of prescribed structure, so presumably after you've got the hang of it, you could pretty much keep churning them out (as long as you kept coming up with new ideas for interpreting the formula).

Also, the more you write, the more confident you become and the more settled in your way of working. Someone who was used to writing romances could write them faster than a fantasy book - and vice versa.

Three books a year doesn't sound that impossible if you're writing full time.

All I can say is that nothing is impossible. As Toothpaste said...it all depends, which is very true.

I could write 3 YAs a year...it takes me 3 months to write and edit one. And I feel pretty comfy with the quality of them.

If you do 3 pages a day, that's 90 pages a month. So two months to write the first draft, and 1 month to edit it.

Then, take a break and research for a month...and the next month, move on to the next.

I'm going to finish the first draft of my first YA in a little over a month. In fact, I'll have been writing for four weeks on Saturday, and I only have 15,000words to go. I don't think I'm skimping on quality at all. I write for 2 hours a night. I've gotten over 3,000 some nights, but the average is about 2,500.

Jet said:

I'm interested in writing both category romance and YA fantasy but can't churn out stories, so the answer to this will help me decide which type of book to try.

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You seem to be worrying about things so far ahead of you that they are less than trivial. It's like panicking about what shoes to wear to an interview before you send the initial application.

Some writers can churn books out, some can't. Simple as that. You could write one book and never bother with a second if that's what you wish.

What you should be concentrating on right now is what kind of book you want to write, and what kind of book you will be proud to see published and give that novel 100% commitment. It would be nice to be able to write all kinds of styles, but what will most likely happen is that if your first book is published, the publisher will be interested in a similar follow up. So if your first novel is fantasy YA, your second book should really be fantasy YA, rather than than contemporary YA or "issue" YA, but if the writing is strong enough you might be able to argue that they are still in the same domain. But the chances of that publisher being interetested in a totally different target audience such as adult romance is very, very small.

Pseudonyms are one solution, but in terms of a career, it might be better to establish yourself in a specific genre and get a few books on the shelf. If they sell as a group, then any one is less likely to be cut from future print runs. If you have a horror here, a romance over there, a YA fantasy somewhere else, then readers won't be able to pinpoint what you, as the author, are about. People seem to think pigeonholing is a bad thing. If you are trying to establish an author-image, it isn't.

Grey

Huh?

Jet said:

I have a writing friend who writes romance and she tells me that Harlequin authors produce at least 3 books a year. I don't believe anyone can write 3+ books a year and not skimp on quality of writing.

Would a publisher expect a writer of YA Fantasy to produce more than 1 book a year?

I'm interested in writing both category romance and YA fantasy but can't churn out stories, so the answer to this will help me decide which type of book to try.

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Three books per year is hardly superhuman writing. Nor is it "churning out" stories. Do you realize you just said that hundred of writers, many of them considered the best of all time, did not produce quality material? The number of classic writers who wrote faster than this, with a quill or fountain pen no less, is staggering.

Many of the best novels we have, some of them extremely long, were written in a month or less. Two of my favorite classic novels were written in fourteen days, and one was written in nine days.

Three romance length novels per year is not even very energetic writing, let along churning out stories. The average pro writer turns out about twice this much prose in a given year, even though it may be one or two really long books, rather than three or four or five shorter books.

I mean, really, get out the calculator. Writing three Harlequin length novels in a year means most writers will be working very little, and lazing around a lot. Three novels of this length per year really is a pretty lazy output.

There is no correlation between speed and quality. Some God-awful novels have been written very slowly, and some of the best novels out there were written very quickly indeed. Some writers can't produce quality material if they take ten years to write a novel, and others produce quality material every last time, even if they write a novel every other week, as some extremely good writers of the past actually did.

Never assume that others can't do something quickly and well just because you can't. All you have to do is look around a bit and you'll find hundreds of writers who do or did produce extremely high quality material at a very rapid pace. Much faster than three Harlequin length novels per year. And this almost certainly includes some of your favorite writers.

But as others have said, you're getting waaaaay ahead of yourself. First you have to write one novel that will sell, however long it takes, and most never get past this stage. If you do, then worry about how many books the publisher will want in a year.

The decision on what to write should not be based on how many novels a publisher will ask for, should you manage to write a first one that's publishable. It should be based or where your interest and talent lie, and on what you most love to read and write.

I don't know what the average is, but I've heard of authors writing about a book a month, or more.

Two chapters a day, every day, and that's 60 chapters a month. Good enough for two books or one really long one. I can finish two chapters in the morning. (I'm still working on the polishing and editing part. ) Thus why I'm not worried about production, but about making it good, which can take a bit of practice.

Production

ButtonTheCat said:

I don't know what the average is, but I've heard of authors writing about a book a month, or more.

Two chapters a day, every day, and that's 60 chapters a month. Good enough for two books or one really long one. I can finish two chapters in the morning. (I'm still working on the polishing and editing part. ) Thus why I'm not worried about production, but about making it good, which can take a bit of practice.

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I think you're right. Production is just a matter of spending time with your butt in the chair. If you write a measly ten words per minute, two hours per day, five days per week, you have 312,000 words per year. This can hardly be called fast writing, it's really very slow, but it still gives you those three harlequins per year.

I suspect most who think quality writing takes a lot of time are either just slow writers, or have never actually written a novel. But if you practice BIC on anything like a regular basis, 300K per year is pretty slow.

My first book took me 18 mos to write. My last one took me just short of three months. And this is with kids and a day job. When I'm hot on the trail of a story, I can do 3 or 4K comfortably. Slow days are when I grind out 1K or even a measly 500 words. JAR is write when he says that the longer your stick with it, the easier it gets to put down words (and to put down good words that require less editing.).

Seriously? After all the responses you got? All you have to say is "!!!!!!!"?

Jet said:

James said: Writing three Harlequin length novels in a year means most writers will be working very little, and lazing around a lot. Three novels of this length per year really is a pretty lazy output.


!!!!!!!

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Seriously, it's ten words per minute, two hours per day, five days per week. This is less than half the output of the average pro writer.

Three per year? Nora Roberts has written more than 160 in twenty-eight years, just about six per year, and 124 of them have been on the The New York Times bestseller list, including twenty-nine that debuted in the number-one spot, so a lot of people must think they have some quality.

Max Brand sold some thirty million words of fiction in only 30 years. This works out to 1,000,000 words per year, or the equivalent of ten 100,000 word novels each year.

The trouble with writing is that most people plan writing, plot writing, think about writing, and read about writing a great deal more than they actually sit down and write.

Jamesaritchie said:

I think you're right. Production is just a matter of spending time with your butt in the chair. If you write a measly ten words per minute, two hours per day, five days per week, you have 312,000 words per year. This can hardly be called fast writing, it's really very slow, but it still gives you those three harlequins per year.

I suspect most who think quality writing takes a lot of time are either just slow writers, or have never actually written a novel. But if you practice BIC on anything like a regular basis, 300K per year is pretty slow.

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LOL!!! Well, James, that's where the problem lies. BIC. I mean, come on, What about American Idol, the stupid reality shows, then there's What not to wear, the cooking channel. I mean, come on.

(Of course, i'm just be silly.)

kim

Dancre said:

LOL!!! Well, James, that's where the problem lies. BIC. I mean, come on, What about American Idol, the stupid reality shows, then there's What not to wear, the cooking channel. I mean, come on.

(Of course, i'm just be silly.)

kim

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Smart writers spend their time watching educational TV. You know, like Stargate SG1.

But I do hope Jordan wins American Idol. And The Food Channel does give me great ideas for supper. And the Travel Channel teaches me all sorts of things, like one of the national dishs of Ecuador is guinea pig. And PBS has such wonderful English programs, and great American shows like Masterpiece Theater, Frontline, American Masters, etc.

And tonight CBS has Ghost Whisperer and Numbers.

Uh, maybe I'd better get back to writing.

But James!! You have to watch What Not to Wear, so when you finally get on Oprah, you'll know what not to wear!!!!

kim

... Yeah that is pretty slow. I can understand if you weren't spending any amount of time in your chair... but if you were and you're still poking about...

Speaking of having BIC and poking about... >.>

In this two hours a day, five days a week thing, where is the room for planning the novel, brainstorming the ideas, editing process, answering emails, doing publicity/marketing etc?

Writing isn't just about writing, strangely.

Jamesaritchie said:

Seriously, it's ten words per minute, two hours per day, five days per week. This is less than half the output of the average pro writer.

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You make it sound so easy. Your blog sort of contradicts this though. I'm not having a go, but as Jo just said, there is more to writing than typing. I can knock out 10,000 words in a single day if I copy them, but if I do more than 2000 my brain turns to jelly and to push for any more would be wasting my time.

Grey Malkin said:

You make it sound so easy. Your blog sort of contradicts this though. I'm not having a go, but as Jo just said, there is more to writing than typing. I can knock out 10,000 words in a single day if I copy them, but if I do more than 2000 my brain turns to jelly and to push for any more would be wasting my time.

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There's nothing easy about it. But take a look at your 2,000 words per day. With a five day week, that's 520,000 words in a year. And my blog contradicts this only because I keep coming way too close to dying. Some things do interfere with writing.

As for the mind turning to jelly, many things cause this, including long work hours away from writing. But you can often extend it by pushing. Writing is a lot like running, and you can, up to a point, gain endurance by running a bit farther each week.

And if you have the hours to use, two writing sessions per day, with several hours between, can also greatly increase endurance. The mind turns to jelly, but a few hours rest allows it to work again.

Working on more than one project at a time can also greatly increase endurance for many writers. Even when I'm at my healthiest, my mind usually turns to mush after 2,500 words on any one project, but I can rest for a couple of hours, take a walk, etc., and my mind is fresh for a very different project.

But those 2,000 words per day should give you more than three average length novels per year, even with rewriting and editing.

For those who fear they can't write three novels a year: trust me, you aren't alone, nor is this kind of hyper-productivity the norm outside of category (and believe me, writers who do produce 3 books a year don't consider it to be lazing around--that kind of production is a stretch even for fast writers, especially when you factor in research, revision, and the editing process. I'm part of a writers' email loop where such things are often discussed).

In genre fiction, especially series fiction, there is pressure to produce a book every year to year-and-a-half. But there are plenty of professional writers--including genre and YA writers--who don't publish that often, and manage to maintain careers even so.

Pick some of your favorite writers, look them up on Amazon, and see how their pub dates spread out. Odds are there will be at least some who have hiatuses of two, three, or even more years between books.

Obviously you should work as hard as you can and write as quickly as you are able. But don't beat yourself up if you aren't the Energizer Bunny. Plenty of us aren't.

- Victoria