I have finally put finishing my first novel, Hello Hell, into high gear. I had a good idea about how long my book should be and believe, especially after reading this post, I’m on the right track. Thanks to Ryan Lanz and author, Doug Lewars for this thorough look at the numbers.
Want to know the stats and if you’re in the ballpark? Read on …
by Doug Lewars
How long should your novel be? The simple answer is that it needs to be just long enough to tell your story. Animal Farm is only 29,966 words and it’s a pretty good tale. At the other end of the spectrum is War and Peace at 544,406. That’s quite a difference.
Now ask yourself this. Have you read Animal Farm? There’s a good chance that you have – particularly since it was on the high-school English curriculum for some years. So have you read War and Peace? Some have – but then some people like to climb mountains, cross deserts and dive deep into the ocean. The point here is that if you have to make a mistake, you should probably err on the low side.
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COW PASTURE CHRONICLES 
My first book in the series I’m working on was “too short” at 40K, but I felt like it did the job of telling the story and kept it like it was. For the purposes of traditional publishing with the houses I’d like to submit to, it was too short. But for my own purposes in self-publishing, it works just fine.
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Thanks Madison for sharing your experiences. I’m aiming for 60,000. Glad to see you in the Cow Pasture and thanks for contributing to the discussion.
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