Writing Blog

20221012 Word Counts

October 12, 2022, 9:15 pm

I did this as a Notebook note, but it was suggested to me by a couple of people that I put it in my blog where it would be easier for people to find. So...

Word counts!

Word counts differ from publisher to publisher, and from source to source. For example, NaNo has a novel starting at 50k words.

In general, these are the various word counts I have come across dealing with trad publishers.:

Fast 55: exactly 55 words
Drabble: exactly 100 words (can include or exclude title)
Flash fiction: up to 500 words or up to 1000 words
Short short: 500-1000 words; or 500-1200 words
Short story: 1000 to 12,500 or 17,500 words; or 500 to 7500 or 10,000 words
Novelette: 7,500 or 10,000 words to 17,500 words
Novella: 12,500 or 17,500 words to 40,000 words
Short novel: 40,000-60,000 words
Novel: 40,000+ or 50,000+ or 60,000+ words
Maximum novel length: 100k words or 120k words or 150k words
At or after 150,000 words, a book can be split in two, but this is not hard and fast at all. Some single novels can exceed 200,000 words! However, it is important to remember debut novelists will generally not be granted the luxury of a long word-count.

Some genres have different definitions. Horror, fantasy and sci-fi generally have a novel start at 80,000 words. In romance a novel starts at 40,000 words, so no "short novel". Fantasy tends to have a higher maximum word count. But the above is pretty much it.

Now, Young Adult used to be 80% of Adult, but following Harry Potter and then subsequent successful series (e.g. Hunger Games, Percy Jackson, et al.), that has gone by the wayside. Middle Grade and Children, check with the publishers. It varies so much that it is insane. The two I've submitted to had a 10K and 12500 word maximum, but I have heard some go much higher nowadays. Albert Whitman, one of the biggest publishers of children's books, does not even mention a word count!

As an aside...
Chapters. The chapter length being pretty consistent is what beginner writers are told, to give them a guideline. But I have read a book recently from one of the Big 4 publishers which follows a 20-page chapter with a 2-page chapter. It's whatever the story needs and what works for the story in question. There are no set hard and fast chapter rules.