There IS No Rule for That

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Word count is a big topic in all the writing groups of which I am a member. Many writers have asked me about the “rule” for book length. Well, to answer the question in a nutshell: there is none. New writers often get hung up on reaching a certain word count, or not going over a certain word count and it hangs like a monkey on their back throughout the whole creative process.

NEVER get bogged down and do that to yourself.

Like anything, there are what they call “norms” for the industry. Novel length works are typically somewhere between 80,000 and 120,000 words, although that is not a hard and fast rule. Additionally, some organizations use a slightly different scale, so even within the boundaries of the “rule,” there are no die-hard rules.

So essentially, translated to pages–and sometimes this changes significantly depending how the book is formatted–your average novel is anywhere from 250 to 500 pages. Again, I’ve read some that were almost in the novella range, but were definitely still novel length, like those heartwarming romances by Richard Paul Evans. I’ve also read some Tom Clancy books that were 650 pages long! Oh, and those oh-so-enjoyable family sagas of Belva Plain’s that you end up on page 590 and wonder why it’s ending already. Just those examples often put it in a different light for a writer.

Sometimes, too, depending on the genre, the norms change a little bit. For example, fantasy novels are typically at the longer range, they tend to run about 500 pages. Love stories without a subplot, such as mystery, may be on the opposite end of the range and a bit shorter than average. But the question is, is it imperative to reach or avoid a certain word count?

Well, I recommend to new writers, never begin a novel with a specific word count in mind. Novels have a way of doing their own thing as you write them, and if you pigeonhole yourself in advance and are dogmatic about making the book a certain length, you’re going to interfere with your own work.

If you have a strong story, multidimensional characters, plot twists, an appropriate amount of dialogue and narrative, the word count typically takes care of itself. If you’re reaching to get it into the novel range, you might not have enough content for that format. Consider making it a novella if you’re really straining to hit the number. If you find yourself with a novel that is the length of Gone With the Wind, you might want to redesign it as a Part One and Part Two project.

As a general rule, though, make the book as long as it needs to be to tell the story without filler. Never take 400 pages to say what you could’ve said in 325. If you’re doing that, you’re bogging it down with unnecessary filler. However, don’t truncate important scenes so that they lose their impact just to trim it down to a certain length.

The best word count for your story is the word count it takes to tell it properly.

Now…for those of you who tell me I talk too much about novels and not enough about web content writing, I promise my next post will be on web content writing, ad copy and e-books. In the meantime, here’s a tip for my fellow web content writers on word count: the word count is whatever the client requests. LOL. True, that’s not really a tip is it? Here’s the thing. ( I love using that expression.) The “thing” is that you don’t really have much leeway with the word count itself, but I promise you it is MUCH easier to overshoot and trim it back than to try to not bypass the requested word count from the beginning. Cutting it back later is just far easier. It must be a law of the universe that no one tells you till you try to do it the other way. Write on!