Average word count fiction book

My own past research on ya word count turned up 5080,000 as an average guideline. If youre hoping to land a book deal with a traditional publisher, you dont. I was scared that agents would reject my book simply because i had got the length wrong. Nonfiction wordcounts sit between 70,000120,000 words. When converting character counts to words, a measure of 5 or 6 characters to a word is generally used for english. Oct 23, 2017 dont count on royalties to support you. But the word count of a chapter matters if you want your story to flow right. Sep 06, 2014 according to chuck sambuchino see below for word count.

And this ebook page length differs significantly depending on the book genre. Yes, having a book that is overly short or overly long for its genre will incrementally decrease your odds of finding traditional publication. Larson writes science fiction with a word count around 100k. When writing a longer book that is aimed at 12yearolds and could maybe be considered tween, using the term upper middle grade is. In the first book i tried to write my chapters were about 500 words long. I once entered a competition that set a maximum word limit of 80,000 for young adult novels and 100,000 for adult novels. Generally a 50,000word novel would be the minimum word count. With that in mind, ive tried to put together the definitive post on word count for fiction novels, young adult, middle grade, childrens. Sep 20, 2019 how many words in a novel vary depending on genre, audience, and the story itself but in general, the average words in a novel is between 60,000 and 90,000 words for most genres. Your guide to book word counts fiction and nonfiction.

As a nonfiction writer myself, i know this is tough. Depending on your genre, having too many or too little can not only hurt your book sales, but also cause fewer 5star. But at the end of the day, you have to write the novel you want to write. While average word length is 50,000 to 80,000 words, this genre has so much variety that word count depends on the book and its intended audience. The most important thing here is to realize that there are always exceptions to these rules. Many, yes, but there are exceptions due to the layout and font size of a particular book.

This is due in large part to the variety of subgenres within it and the trend for a book series with an ever greater word count. What is the ideal word count for a nonfiction book in the. The word count is the number of words in a document or passage of text. A minimum count for a nonfiction ebook is about 10,000 words, as long as the content is solid. That said, this figure differs from book to book and organization to. If youve ever read a joke book or a book revolving around a humorous endeavor of some sort, it falls under this book category. Literary agent paula munier says a 90,000 word count is the sweet spot for debut fiction. Anything above 70k but less than 115k science fiction and fantasy tend to run up around 100k115k words. Aug 15, 2019 the relationships genre is not to be confused with the fiction romance genre. A word count guide for 18 book genres, including fiction and. I use the target average of 1,500 words per chapter. Of course, when youre writing the first draft of your story, you want to just get your words out on paper. If im writing a novel, this gives me 40 chapters and 70,000 words when im done.

Romance novels often run between 50,000 and 90,000 words on average. Word count for novels and books is something i dont think about too often until i travel to a writers conference, and then someone asks a simple, innocent question. Middle grade is from 20,000 55,000, depending on the subject matter and age range, and the word count of these books has been trending up in recent years. Search for word count totals in books word counters. A word count guide for 18 book genres, including fiction.

But for mainstream ya it is always best to stick to under 80k. However, we do not suggest writing a novel of 500,000 words unless you as established as stephen king is. For example, atonement has a word count of 123,378 and my utility comes up with 110,765 words. Amazon ebook page length by genre kindle page length. As you can see, established authors get much more flexibility when it comes to the length of their book. That said, the average word count for science fiction and fantasy. For childrens fiction, the general rule is the younger the audience the shorter the book, and for ya novels the average is 50,00070,000 words. May 14, 2018 literary agent paula munier says a 90,000 word count is the sweet spot for debut fiction.

Nonfiction books tend to be shorter, around 45,000 words on average, and novels ten to be longer, around 80,000 words on average. Pencilthin books on narrow topics that are under 50,000 words are quite common. Yes, you should go through the novel revision checklist and take out anything extraneous no matter what. Jan 08, 2018 calculate book page count using your word count. A single novel can be longer, but once the length is above 110,000 words publishers may look at cutting it back, unless it is a particular kind of book books over the 110k word count are usually considered epics. Apr 05, 2015 generally a 50,000word novel would be the minimum word count. Oct 18, 2017 therefore, the word count of a novel is crucial if you want your book to be fit for publication. Again, higher word counts usually mean that the writer does not know how to edit themselves. With fun, lighthearted, simple middle grade youll want to stay around the 20k30k word count range.

And remember, keeping to word counts is important, but what makes or breaks your chances with a publisher is the quality of your manuscript. King, and lee child run well over 90k, sometimes going as high as 120k. Take a good look at the average word counts you need for a novel or non fiction. As for non fiction books, the standard bestsellers have word counts similar to adult novels. We all know of outliers within each genre that have been published well under, or well over, these word counts. Never pad your manuscript just to meet a word count guideline. Traditionally published mysteries, like the books of sara paretsky, louise penny, laurie r.

The average nonfiction book is about 50,000 to 75,000 words, which is about 153 to 230 ebook pages. However, there is a wide range of acceptable word counts for non fiction books. All of these are average book word count ranges and should not be taken as the definitive word count you must reach in your book. The best thing that you can do is look over comparable books and try to judge word count by their size, average wordspage, and illustration content. Book size is often based on how thick the spine will be and how it will stand out in a bookstore although things are changing. Id guesstimate that non fiction books generally yes, this is very rough run perhaps 150450 pages, and at about 350 wdpage that works out to something like 50150k words. Calculate book page count using word count for book design. None of them fit the industry standard in word count. I agree that it seems like for a debut author, the agent really looks at that word count. Word counts may also be used to calculate measures of readability and to measure typing and reading speeds usually in words per minute.

The average wordcount for adult fiction is between 70,000 to 120,000 words. First of all, find your word count in word by opening your document and looking at the bottom left of your screen. If yes, then most publishers still work on specific word count lengths for books so youll probably be aiming for around 60,00080,000 words for nonfiction. Like a general fiction novel, a good target word count for a memoir is 80,000 words. Once you know your word count, follow one of our two methods below to estimate your page count. I get a lot of questions about word count for urban fiction novels. The average fiction book is about 80,000 to 100,000 words, which is about. Shorter novels such as fahrenheit 451, the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, the great gatsby, and slaughterhousefive are between 4050,000 words. Jul 23, 2012 echoing my earlier sentiment, michael added, someone once said no good book is ever too long, and no bad book is ever too shorti dont have numbers so much as a simple way for any writer to find out how long a book should be.

Before you decide your average chapter length, its a good idea to think about the purpose behind dividing a book into chapters. And man, people love to point out exceptionsand they always will. Jan 08, 2018 this article on writers digest also suggests a length of around 100115,000, and takes a good look at desirable word count ranges for different genres. Jun 15, 2017 this is a general list of age categories and word counts for childrens books. Aug 05, 2019 all of these are average book word count ranges and should not be taken as the definitive word count you must reach in your book. Word count for book series the first book in each series below was the authors first. Jul 24, 2009 my upperlevel ya novel is 211 pages, 61,078 words, tnr 12 pt. Each page contains about 34 lines, with an average word count of 11 words per line, thus 375 words per page. As you write more and more your word count will probably go up for each chapter because you become a stronger writer and are able to go more in depth in each chapter. Do you want to publish a wide format bookwith inspiring quotes down the side margins. On average, there are about 300 words per page in a book. What occurred to me while reading was how the predetermined word counts make it more difficult to query a novel that crosses categories. I have therefore made some averages, based on what ive heard from publishers and agents at childrens book events, and from research and reading.

It should be enough to communicate your message effectively. If youre new to selfpublishing on amazon and wondering, just how much should i write for my kindle book. Of course, rules are made to be broken, especially in literature. A good way to gauge appropriate length is to check out similar books for comparison. Neither too long nor too short, this book length signals a novelists competency and knowledge of the publishing market to prospective agents and editors.

Word count for novels and childrens books writers digest. It makes quite a difference whether you want to publish a childrens picture book, a 50recipe smoothie book, a science fiction novel or a technical encyclopedia. Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price of a translation job. I have often looked this up and got different results, which makes it very confusing. Recently i got asked this question, what is the ideal length word count wise for my first book.

The average mean word count was about 73,000 words. So itll be off on occasion, but it should get you relatively close for the average book. Urban fiction publishing requirements urban fiction news. Writing for young adults a look at the numbers hannah holt. It seems like ya novels are getting longer and longer nowadays, but maybe my attention span is getting shorter. If yours is too short, restructure it and add more tightly written stuff. Jun 27, 2019 put simply, the sweet spot for a novels word count is generally said to be around 8090k.

A reasonable word count for a nonfiction book would be between 30,000 to 50,000 words. What is a reasonable estimate for the minimum length, in word count, for a non fiction book. Your chapter length has to work well with the overall word count of the book short chapters create an even distribution of both content and action. Its often possible to take a good 30,000 words out of a book without really affecting the content, just by being rigorous about what works what words, sentences, paragraphs, scenes and chapters. Use these numbers as a baseline for your writing goals.

The longest is the order of the phoenix with a word count of 257,000 words. Minimum realistic word count of nonfiction book writing. Books in this genre are also often gag gifts or are meant to be. In outlining your book in 3 easy steps, editor shawn coyne says, the average novel today is about 90,000 words. Novelist jane smiley suggests that length is an important quality of the novel. If your book is too long and you need to cut it, dont fret. Youll use the word count in your word document to calculate book page count.