What is your ideal novel length?

[nossmf]

When I was young (teens/20s) I tended to prefer shorter books, <300 pgs, so I could read them fast and move on to the next book, I could never get enough different titles under my belt. Back in high school I made it a point of pride to read 5 books a week.

Now I'm pushing 40, I tend to prefer the longer epics, 500-800 for stand alone books or 1k+ for trilogies (which I consider to be a single story split up into multiple covers). I've only read a handful of uber-long single books (Shogun and a few Tom Clancy novels), but loved them deeply.

Which is all great to hear for the sake of my first novel, a 186k word fantasy, which has received great praise from readers. But until I get published a few times with shorter titles, I don't think I'll ever get the first novel trade-published. More's the pity.

 

[Sunflowerrei]

I guess ideally, I tend to read more in the 300-600 page range, but if the story or subject sucks me in, I'll definitely go longer--I read two Ron Chernow books earlier this year and they were awesome and about 800 and over 900 pages, respectively. I read a lot of historical fiction and that tends to be a bit longer than some other genres, but not as long fantasy epics. I'll admit to being dissuaded by a long word count or a long page count, though. I've read all eight Outlander books, but by the last few, I could barely contain my impatience to move the story along already.

As for my preferred length to write--the one thing I've published is a 30,000 word novella, though I'm working on a novel now that I'm aiming for around 90K with.

 

[zmethos]

I feel like about 400 pages is ideal for me, just based on novels I've read and enjoyed. Funny, because my own books tend to be shorter. And then again, I'm currently reading Wolf Hall, and it's massive. Still, the size might be one of the reasons I avoided picking it up for so long.

 

[spork]

After a quick glance at my shelf, I'll apparently buy and read almost anything if it seems interesting in the store. I do tend to gravitate towards thinner books simply because they weigh less. At work, I am pretty much a turtle, carrying everything I need around in a backpack. If I'm lugging around a 500-page monster, it better be damn good.

 

[Cindyt]

Fat ones.

 

[nossmf]

Fat ones.

"He likes big BOOKS and he cannot lie!"

 

[sunandshadow]

As a reader I tend to prefer novels in the 500-600 word range.

 

[mrsmig]

Do you mean 500-600 page range? Because 500-600 words is barely a short story.

 

[DancingMaenid]

Generally, I prefer novels in the 200-350 page range, give or take. I'm a pretty slow reader, not in the sense of words per minute but in the sense of only reading for short stretches of time as a rule, and not having a very good attention span. It can literally take me months to finish longer, more epic novels.

I do like the experience of reading a long novel over a period of time. It can be nice to meander through a 900-page novel over the course of a couple months. But I don't want that on a regular basis.

 

[Alary]

Doorstoppers. I love doorstoppers.