Average number of word in a book of short stories

Are there guidelines with regard to word count for a firsttime novelist. Youll receive an email on the first day of each month with our winning story and the prompt for our next contest. Onethird of the novels that come into the agency are rejected because theyre too long or short, perkins says. Pay rates are often low, but for so few words, the rate per word averages quite high. Ive sold stories from as little as 300 words to a newspaper to as many as 0. With fun, lighthearted, simple middle grade youll want to stay around the 20k30k word count range.

They are short books, usually with a lot of illustrations. In general terms, a short story will be under 7,500 words. Bookend the 7,000 word story with two flash fictions, perhaps. Short stories are often defined as any story under 7,500 words. A step up from picture books, these are for kids who have just started reading by themselves. The average wordcount for adult fiction is between 70,000 to 120,000 words. For average word counts based on genre, see this handy reference. Ive seen short story anthologies that are in the range of novella length all the way up to more than 150k words. That said, if your book is around 40,000 words, youre in good company. Precise word count definitions will vary, but as a general rule of thumb, a short story is anything up to about 7500 words sometimes 10,000, with. At an average of 2500 words per story, that makes 16 stories. There were rumors in 20 that amazon had set a minimum word. Using amazons number of words as a guide, 5,000 words would equal 26. Can be publisher specific, ranging from 3,000 to absolute max 5,000.

The average short story should run anywhere from 5,000 to 10,000 words, but they can be anything above 1,000 words. For most publishers, a book is novellength when its between 50,000 and 110,000 words. A statistical analysis of the sherlock holmes stories sir arthur conan doyles sherlock holmes stories represent some of the finest detective literature ever written. Bearing in mind if you opt for a shorter word count, you might not be able to print on the spine should you set up a print document. Young adult fiction allows for a lot of flexibility in word count. A publisher should have the standard number of words they are looking for available somewhere on their website. If you write a story of under 1,000 words, most people seem to regard this as flash fiction. The number of words will vary depending on the age of the reader the book is intended for. 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. But those requests are extremely rare, as the majority will set a limit of 8k. Average nonfiction word counts biographies and memoirs. Writing middle grade a look at the numbers hannah holt.

Dec 12, 20 the new york times top ten stories had the highest average word count, coming in at just over 2,000 words. Perkins agency in new york says its much easier to market a firsttime novelists book if the word count falls between 80,000 and 100,000 words, or roughly 300 doublespaced, typed pagesthe average novel length. Obviously, a complete collection is a complete collection, but i feel like i have a few stories that could be added or removed to maintain the integrity of the collection. Word count for famous novels organized by hawthorn mineart, under books, writing. Usually, short stories are measured by word count, not the number of pages.

I thought it would be interesting to explore how the quality of a story relates to statistical properties of the text itself. Novelist jane smiley suggests that length is an important quality of the novel. These are growing in popularity for selfpublishing with the growing ebook industry. Upper middle grade can hit in the 50k word count range possibly longer, if its something really special. The condemned man, incidentally, had an expression of such doglike resignation that it looked as if one could set him free to roam around the slopes and would only have to whistle at the start. Many of these books are written in rhyme or in a simple singsong meter that is catchy and fun. Based on this list compiled by nicole humphrey cook.

Sep 05, 20 all hail the bookeen, a new format thats perfect for short stories, novellas and essays julian gough thu 5 sep 20 07. Picture books for children up to age eight average words though many are shorter. What is the average word count for short story submissions. A statistical analysis of the sherlock holmes stories. Be sure to subscribe to our email updates for free. In my experience, individual short stories dont tend to sell well on kindle compared to novels. How many words or pages in the average short story book. All hail the bookeen, a new format thats perfect for short stories, novellas and essays julian gough thu 5 sep 20 07. In total doyle wrote four holmes novels and 56 short stories, a body of work enthusiasts affectionately refer to as the canon. If the average length is 300 pages, youre looking at a 75,000 word manuscript approximately one reason its harder for a new author to sell a 140,000 word manuscript is the size of the book. In 2011, the lists average length peaked at 467 pages. Sep 04, 2010 no min or max, an anthology is just a collection so anywhere from 3 up but id say no more than like 17 ish they are based on stories, not word count but a short story cant be over like 800 words or something. Aug 05, 2019 before diving into the specifics of genrebased word counts, lets look at the broader picture of average book length. The fact that this article the length of a decentsized short story managed.

A short story collection is a great way to release some shorts with a word count that makes the price reasonable. Generally, 50,000 would be considered the minimum word count, and ideally a novel should be over 70,000 words. If you self pub, places such as amazon will print a book as low as 24 pages, so if your poetry is an epic poem it can be almost 1. Duotrope a free writers resource listing over 3950 current fiction and poetry publications caps their search for short story publishers at 7,500 words, which means most publishers are looking for stories of less than that length. However, there is a wide range of acceptable word counts for nonfiction books. While the stories of other peoples lives are fascinating, readers dont want to slog through anything that drags on and on. Some people might regard this as a novelette or novella. Though the average word count of a chapter is around 2,000 5,000 words, it all depends on your story. Some authors write chapters as long as 12k words, and this can be okay for some, and a bit wordy for others. Jul 15, 2018 it depends on how long you want the book to be. These are basic learning books that creatively teach colors, numbers or simple, fun stories for bedtime. It seems like ya novels are getting longer and longer nowadays, but maybe my attention span is getting shorter. If you cant find something that tells you what the publisher is interested in, shoot for a story around words and explain that the story is.

Within short stories, there is a further breakdown to define super short stories as flash and microflash. Average word count ranges from 70,000 to 100,000 words, although biographies of major celebrities or public figures can support a higher number. As for nonfiction books, the standard bestsellers have word counts similar to adult novels. How many short stories make a collection writing stack exchange. Microfiction and flash fiction are the tweets of the fiction world. Between the ages of four and eight, children have picture books read to them and also begin to read themselves. Jun 27, 2019 a story that is over 40,000 words is generally considered a novel. For a novel, i would recommend at least 50,000 words in length. Of the 161 stories listed, 3081 is the median word count number in the middle and 4052 is the average word count. Short stories range anywhere from 1,500 to 30,000 words. By most peoples standards, 40,000 words would be pretty short for a novel. Precise word count definitions will vary, but as a general rule of thumb, a short story is anything up to about 7500 words sometimes 10,000, with higher word counts typically called novelettes, and short novels called novellas.

Word count for famous novels organized commonplace book. This is because font size, type of font, spacing etc. The average mean word count was about 53,000 words. Pencilthin books on narrow topics that are under 50,000 words are quite common. The complete stories average around 1500 words, with the longest at around 2500 and the shortest at 311 yeah, not really a short story, but the next shortest one is 1,100. Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price of a translation job. Bearing in mind if you opt for a shorter word count, you might not be able to print o. Lewis the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe, roald dahls charlie and the chocolate factory. In terms of competitions, short story length is usually between 1,000 and 5,000 words, although i have seen short story competitions with a 17,000 word maximum. As with everything else when it comes to writing a book, these are only guidelinesnot rules. A story that is over 40,000 words is generally considered a novel. Oct 01, 2012 a scene that takes place in ten or fewer pages can comfortably be considered short.

Word counting may be needed when a text is required to stay within certain numbers of words. Kindle publishing faq tck publishing book publisher and. The average nonfiction book is about 50,000 to 75,000 words, which is about 153 to 230 ebook pages. Short story collections are notoriously had to place over the transom. Try to fill in the blanks around the 1, 7, 14 and 21 with a variety of lengths.

This is a terrific way to whet readers appetites for your longer works or get them interested in the plot of your next book. Mar 20, 2018 precise word count definitions will vary, but as a general rule of thumb, a short story is anything up to about 7500 words sometimes 10,000, with higher word counts typically called novelettes, and short novels called novellas. Word counts may also be used to calculate measures. In two minutes, i found ebooks ranging from 10 to 950 pages.

A scene that takes place in ten or fewer pages can comfortably be considered short. How many short stories are generally in a short story. Creating a short story collection is a little different from creating a traditional novel, so here are a few things to consider. If you are writing young adult that can go smaller, if you writing advance technical stuff that can go bigger.

Big, epic stories get anywhere from 120,000 to 200,000 words. Within short stories, there is a further breakdown to define supershort stories as flash and microflash. Both have made it to the final round vancouver losing in 7 games to the ny rangers or, as don cherry put it the ny oilers back in the 90s. Flash fiction is a short story that is 500 words or less. Apr 11, 2015 stephen king word count 112263 274,672 bag of bones 203,3 black house 252,270 blockade billy 15,917 carrie 60,718 cell 121,931 christine 193,602 cujo 121,150 cycle of the werewolf 15,955 desperation 195,011 doctor sleep. This may particularly be the case in academia, legal proceedings, journalism and advertising. I try not to put two really long stories back to back. The new york times top ten stories had the highest average word count, coming in at just over 2,000 words.

Speaking of short the really short nhl season is about over, and both vancouver and ottawa are in the playoffs. Its free, its fun, and the winner gets published in prime number magazine and receives a free book from press 53. For a compilation of short stories, i would shoot for at. Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price for the translation job.

For fiction, i recommend 5,000 words or more for short stories. For a compilation of short stories, i would shoot for at least 30,000 words. There are general guidelines for each literary category. Some authors have short 25 page chapters while other authors may have novels with chapters that are over 10,000 words. But remember that too many short scenes in a row can make the flow of the plot feel choppy, and disrupt the continuity that john gardner said creates a dream for the. A story about an unusual school dealing with a rather mundane subject. The science fiction and fantasy writers of america specifies word lengths for each category of its nebula award.

Stephen king word count 112263 274,672 bag of bones 203,3 black house 252,270 blockade billy 15,917 carrie 60,718 cell 121,931 christine 193,602 cujo 121,150 cycle of the werewolf 15,955 desperation. Onethird of the novels that come into the agency are rejected because theyre too long or. An ebook with 15 pages amounts to only around 3000 words. Jun 03, 20 mix up the long stories and the short stories. Chapter length varies greatly even within individual books.

Typically a writer will have published most or all of the stories in other venues and then. Although marquez has an average word count of 2,412 words and overall his short story lengths are quite consistent at the high 2000s, he also has a flash fiction. The word count at big five publishers had a slightly narrower range. At a writers conference i recently attended, publishing veteran jane friedman said 80,000 words is good for most fiction, below 60,000 isnt novel length territory, and above 120,000 is likely too much.

Yet some in the industry consider novelettes and novellas to also be short stories, which are up to 17,000 words or up to 40,000 words respectively. I agree that it seems like for a debut author, the agent really looks at that word count. Most middle grade novels are between 40,000 and 69,000 words long. Im seeing more and more small, indy publishers publishing collections, but i havent gotten my hands on many to see whats average for number of stories. Randall stocks article rating sherlock holmes the baker street journal, december 1999, pp. On the upper end, a novel over 110,000 words is considered an. The stories should be easy to follow and have an average word count of 1,000 to 10,000 words, a range similar to an adult short story. 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. There are plenty of books that purposefully play with the word counts of their chapters.

Better to have solid, clear information than rambling to make a page count. Jun 20, 2011 a publisher should have the standard number of words they are looking for available somewhere on their website. I am currently at 20k words between 16 stories, complete and 3 incomplete. Word count for famous novels, in ascending order by number of words. Youll usually find a novella is in the 40,000word range, with a maximum of 50,000 words by most generalized definitions. According to amazons great text stats feature, the median length for all books is about 64,000 words. The big short why amazons kindle singles are the future.