I had an email recently from a writer who was worried that his word count was too low for his genre.
I sent him a link to some information that I hoped would help him out. And told him that having a low word count is much better than having one that’s too high.
Most editors have a range that they want for a particular genre. If you’re a debut novelist, then they definitely don’t want a 130,000+ word book from you. They probably don’t even want a 110,000 word book from you. It would be considered risky for them…after all, a book that long would be expensive to print and debut novelists don’t have a track record for sales or a following.
There is definitely, though, some leeway with word count in a manuscript. If you’re a few thousand words over or under the range, it’s probably not going to kill your chances. You can always bulk up a book with a great subplot or edit out extras to bring a word count down.
I do keep half an eye on my word count as I’m writing. For one thing, it helps me know if I’m meeting my goals each day. For another, it helps save me some time after my first draft is done if my word count is close to my target.
For additional information on word count and tips for bumping your word count up or down, try these links:
Word Count for Novels and Children’s Books: The Definitive Post
Think twice before querying your 291,000 word book
An agent with word counts for different genres
A Few Words on Word Counts: How to Beef Up or Slim Down (especially for freelance writers, but some tips that will help novelists, too)
An agent on word counts (and here, where she defends her position)
Writing Nowadays–Word Count Violations and You
How to increase your novel’s word count
How To Get Ahead When You Are Behind On Your Word Count
The Writer’s Knowledge Base has many articles on word count.
Will the rise of e-publishing mean that word count might rise again? This article from the BookEnds Literary Agency suggests it might, but I’m not so sure. It seems to me that our 21st century world seems to make us all more distracted—phones ringing, texts coming in, Twitter feeds and Facebook status updates. Do we have the attention span for longer books, even if cost isn’t an issue anymore?
How close do you track word count? Do you usually find yourself writing over or under your target? (I’m frequently a little under, myself.)
Elizabeth – Thanks very much for the useful links. I do think about word count but honestly, that doesn’t come first. The first thing is that I write my story. Then, when I’ve revised, I look at the word count. If it’s very much different from typical I add a scene or two. I almost always find, too, that I’m more likely to need to add than take away. I tend not to be particularly wordy when I write.
Cool; thanks for the links.
I keep an eye out on my word counts too; just to see that I’m meeting not only my work count for the day – uhm month, for me – but also to see if I’m over/underwriting a scene or chapter.
I can get too wrapped up in word count though, and stimy myself.
good advice.
……..dhole
Great links. Thanks. The first draft of the manuscript I just finished came in at 79K. Second draft was 97K. The completed version is 89K.
Happy Weekend!
I shouldn’t admit this, but before the internet, I use to count words in genre books I was interested in.
Great post.
Excellent links, Elizabeth! I used to be less aware of word count, but my books gradually got shorter and shorter. I now advise all new writers to keep it under 100,000.
Thanks for all these links, Elizabeth. I have become aware of word count through taking part in NaNoWriMo, where there are some lovely graphs to keep track of it for you.
Personally I have quite a sparse writing style which has been adversely commented on sometimes (‘why didn’t you describe this?’ ‘what does that look like?’) but I like it that way! I think it’s partly because I am not keen on tiny little details and as a reader I often skim across descriptive paragraphs.
I really watch my word count. Usually there’s a moment of panic when I realize it’s a bit on the low side!
I think epublishing will result in more variation. I know that I am not the only writer who loves the idea that with ebooks you can focus on getting the story right, and afterwards you sell it as short story, novella or novel and price it accordingly. So I´ll do what I can to turn my current WIP into a decent-sized novel, but I have a couple of stories lying around which are probably more suited for the flexible novella size.
This is great information! Thank you so much. I’ll be sending a few people over to read this.
Great links — as always.
I track daily so I feel like I did something. I don’t really look for total until I combine everything in the rough draft.
Donna–Monthly word counts are good!
I think I’m too Type A not to keep *some* sort of eye on it. Plus, I’ve been burned a couple of times by coming in really low and needing to bump it up a bit.
Margot–Sounds like you and I are the same way! Always needing to add.
Diane–I think that’s really sound advice.
Sheila–I skip those parts as a reader, too! I think a reader gets a better image of a character in her head when we just barely sketch it out. Then they can say, “Oh! He reminds me of Uncle Jim!” And having her uncle in her head as my character makes him come to life so much easier than anything else I could have done.
Alex–I have those paniky moments, too! I’m always, always on the low side. Always.
Carol–Sounds perfect to me!
Heather–Thanks!
Teresa–It must be nice to be interested in numbers as well as words! Ha! That would have driven me a little batty with frustration, I think. But you would have known exactly what your target length was!
Dorte–I’m very interested in trying different length manuscripts for epubbing….fun to experiment. :)
GigglesandGuns–That’s me–I like to know where I am.
For me, it’s totally different. My goal is to make the story long enough to fill up the pages as necessary with the corresponding illustrations in my stories. They really are very short stories and I have a lot of filler pages in the books. Trying to keep them the same amount of pages for consistency’s sake. But then again, I write children’s stories and I self-publish using createspace and I know if I go over a certain amount of pages, the cost will be slightly higher and I don’t need that.
Just tonight I had to look up the word count for picture books as I was inspired by someone on plurk to write a story about a missing shirt. He went to ISTE in Philly a couple of weeks ago (or within the last two weeks) and when he returned home, his bowling shirt was missing. He had posted for folks to stop by and see him and get their picture taken with his bowling shirt. So over the past week or so, he’s been putting the postings out there to try to find his shirt. Tonight, a picture book idea came to me about the missing shirt (it will be a boy who came home from summer camp missing his favorite shirt and the shirt will make its way across the United States from boy to boy until it finds its rightful home) – already wrote a couple of pages but am about to rewrite it – lol. I had to know what my word limit was going to be for a picture book – so really doesn’t matter what genre you are writing in – you need to know these things, so thank you, Elizabeth (the other other E or Elizabeth – lol – long story on that) for posting this – Funny how things come at you at the time you need them – E :)
Ma America, The Travelin’ Maven (Elysabeth Eldering)
Author of the JGDS, 50-state, mystery, trivia series
Where will the adventure take you next?
http://jgdsseries.blogspot.com
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I track my word count closely, recording my opening and closing counts every writing session, but this is more for tracking my goals than anything else.
My first drafts tend to be long but at times I’ll include things simply to get them out of my head. On the second pass I can then take this extra material and boil it down to something usable.
Great advice Elizabeth and thanks for the excellent links.
Word counts for different genres – VERY helpful. Thanks. This post is a “saver.”
I’ve only just jumped from picture books to MG so my word count is on the short side. Thanks for the advice and all those links.
Elysabeth–Good point about the cost involved! And cost is definitely an issue, whether it’s the publisher having to absorb the cost for a long book, or whether we have to do it ourselves.
Sounds like a great book, Elysabeth! And you’re right–we have to have an idea what our end goal is. Cozy mysteries, my genre, all run 65,000–80,000 words and that’s pretty firm. It’s always nice to know what we’re shooting for!
Karen–Hope it will help!
Gene–It really can be a motivator–either to pat ourselves on the back that we *have* met our goals, or to buckle down and do more writing, if we *haven’t*!
Catherine–I always write short myself, so love those kinds of posts. :)
The only worrying about word count I do right now is in getting stuff on paper at all.