Long book word counts

Find out how long it will take you to read any book by using our book word count search. Every book is different and for any suggested word or page count you see, you are likely to encounter several popular fantasy books that are outside. Some are as short as 50,000 wordsthe perfect book for a beach vacation. The hunger games has a word count of 99,750 and my utility calculates it at 98,916. Special thanks go to logos bible software for making determining the longest book of the bible by hebrew or greek word count much easier. I used logos bible software to find out which books are the longest, by original word count. Since just comparing the number of unique words in a book does not take its length into account i decided to calculate the percentage of unique words of the whole text.

We are also going to look at how harry potter is comparable to other young adult novels in regards to word count. For example, if an author has to write a minimum or maximum amount of words for an article, essay, report, story, book, paper, you name it. If you liked electric literatures game of books infographic that compared the length of a song of ice and fire to classic novels, you might enjoy this infographic created for cartridge discount. Despite their ongoing success, those epic sagas are the rare exception to general word count rules. The chinese wuxia novelist jin yong wrote a number of long novels, of which the. Word counts may also be used to calculate measures of readability and to measure typing and reading speeds usually in words per minute. Since opinions vary greatly, i did some research to verify the numbers in my head. Search for a book, tell us how fast you read, and start reading. Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price of a translation job. However, there is a wide range of acceptable word counts for nonfiction books.

This is a list of the novels over 500,000 words published through a mainstream publisher. I mean, sure, they have to create an entirely different universe in some cases, that takes description, but, i do struggle with reading really long books, and usually end up skimming some of the descriptive narrative parts. If yours is too short, restructure it and add more tightly written stuff. Like everything in writing, you may write a work of genius that smashes all the rules. Below are approximate word counts for kings published books. To find out how long should a chapter be, we examined books from. Sure thing and some king to read whilst you recover. A statistical analysis of robert jordans the wheel of. There are also some subgenres that have slightly different conventions. A single novel can be longer, but once the length is above 110,000 words publishers may look at cutting it back, unless it is a particular kind of book books over the 110k word count are usually considered epics. The actual word count for the hunger games is 99,750 and my utility calculates 94,743 words. Also, heres another list i may swipe and add in here. It should be enough to communicate your message effectively. Unfortunately, they dont offer word count so ive created an algorithm based on the number of pages, genre, and the dimensions of the book.

The actual word count for harry potter and the sorcerers stone is 78,792 and my utility calculates 77,876. Reading length is a participant in the amazon services llc associates program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to and affiliated sites. Calculate book page count using the word count from your word document. Middle grade is from 20,000 55,000, depending on the subject matter and age range, and the word count of these books has been trending up in recent years. Word counts on every book of the bible from longest to shortest 1 jeremiah 33,002 2 genesis 32,046 3 psalms 30,147 4 ezekiel 29,918 5 exodus 25,957 6 isaiah 25,608 7 numbers 25,048 8 deuteronomy 23,008 9. With that in mind, ive tried to put together the definitive post on word count for fiction novels, young adult, middle grade, childrens books and even memoir. At a writers conference i recently attended, publishing. The hobbit has more unique words and a higher unique word density than both the silmarillion and each volume in the lord of the rings. A rough way to count words in an english language text is to assume that a standard formatted page with 12 pt courier font and doublespaced lines is 250 words. But that contract is dependent upon the book s genre.

If youre writing a young adult fantasy novel, you should keep your word count below 90,000 words or 300 book pages. They can be up to 180,000 words, or even over 200,000, but the novel must be wonderful and must fully justify its word count. Better to have solid, clear information than rambling to make a page count. The longest is the order of the phoenix with a word count of 257,000 words. Literary agent paula munier says a 90,000 word count is the sweet spot for debut fiction. As a reader, ive never felt a good book was too long, even more than a thousand pages. How long does a book have to be at writing for children and teens. If you are an author of a book or know of a book s accurate wordcount, contact me. But if youre curious to see how your manuscript measures up to to the standard word count expectations for your genre, the following is a summary of an informative article by chuck sambuchino called word count.

If youre writing an adult fantasy novel or an epic fantasy novel like game of thrones, your word count can skew higher at 90,000 200,000 words. Picture book word count, and other rules that are meant to. Word counts for childrens books i received a request awhile ago to do a post on word counts for different age categories in childrens lit. The longest novel is artamene ou le grand cyrus, originally published. Never pad your manuscript just to meet a word count guideline. When writing a longer book that is aimed at 12yearolds and could maybe be considered tween, using the term upper middle grade is advisable.

Yes, having a book that is overly short or overly long for its genre will incrementally decrease your odds of finding. These word counts are my personal references they are not official, and do not include back matter, which is bonus material for the reader or information geared for parents, teachers, or. But it may indeed decrease your odds, especially for a debut. Word counts of the most popular books in the world foster grant uk. But for print publishing, the physical cost of producing the book is an issue, and the market does generally know what it likes. Fleshing out an imagined historical world lends itself to a higher word count, so historical fiction tends to be closer to 100,000 words. Everything you need to know about novel word counts nathan. In other words, you must be scrupulous about editing every sentence for length. Its a question often asked by aspiring authors wondering if their manuscript is several thousand words too long or short, but its also an intriguing one for readers to consider. Pencilthin books on narrow topics that are under 50,000 words are quite common. Well, different publishers look for different lengths for different genres. Most young adult novels fall between 55,000 and 70,000 words. For average word counts based on genre, see this handy reference. These numbers are pulled from the original languages using logos bible softwareyou can see how i did it below.

A statistical analysis of robert jordans the wheel of time. How can the books of the bible be listed from shortest to. Word count for famous novels organized commonplace book. Anything over 110,000 words is considered too long for a fiction novel. Novels for adult readers fall between 80,000 and 120,000 words. Nonfiction wordcounts sit between 70,000120,000 words.

Wikipedia suggests it is some 1 million words longer than the malazan book of the fallen. If youre writing for a more literary audience, then the rules above apply on upper limits. Right now, when it comes to novellength word count, its all about 90,000 words. Virtually every book i try to shop by a debut author thats any longer than thatregardless of categoryreceives the same response from editors. When converting character counts to words, a measure of 5 or 6 characters to a word is generally used for english. The longest book of the new testament, and the twelfth longest book of the entire bible, is the gospel of luke with 19,482 greek words. Regarding the value of adhering to standard word counts, jackie bates, a former managing editor at aa publishing, adds. For the book hatchet, the actual word count is 41,672 and i give you 41,212. As for nonfiction books, the standard bestsellers have word counts similar to adult novels.

I use amazons data feeds to come up with the calculation. A minimum count for a nonfiction ebook is about 10,000 words, as long as the content is solid. Knowing where to look to locate your word count will help you determine how long your book is actually going to be once its finished and you. Publishers want to know the overall length of your book. Wordcounter will help to make sure its word count reaches a specific requirement or stays within a certain limit. Your guide to book word counts fiction and nonfiction. For most publishers, a book is novellength when its between 50,000 and 110,000 words. Everything you need to know about novel word counts. The graphic looks at the length of some famous novels, poems, and plays from literary history. Word count matters because every book, regardless of genre, has an inherent.

Search for word count totals in books word counters. Neither too long nor too short, this book length signals a novelists competency and knowledge of the publishing market to prospective agents and editors. Weighing in at over 4 million words, the wheel of time is assuredly among the longest fantasy series out there, although reliable data on the matter is elusive. Word count for famous novels organized by hawthorn mineart, under books, writing. I used the lexham hebrew bible and the nestlealand novum testamentum graece for these word counts. What are the longest and shortest books of the bible. All we have to do is use the wp tool that shows word count. Like a general fiction novel, a good target word count for a memoir is 80,000 words. Calculate book page count using word count for book design. 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. In this article, were going to look at how many words are in the harry potter series.

A very short or very long word count is not going to kill your chances. Discover the sweet spot for your chapters word count in this post featuring j. Word count matters because every book, regardless of genre, has an inherent contract with the reader. The average nonfiction book is about 50,000 to 75,000 words, which is about 153 to 230 ebook pages. A reasonable word count for a nonfiction book would be between 30,000 to 50,000 words. The eight harry potter books have an impressive combined word count of over 1 million words. We explain two easy methods to estimate your book s page count. Tucker max tucker has sold over 5 million books as a 4x nyt bestselling author and is the cofounder of scribe.

Find out how long your favourite books are and how they compare to their contemporaries and books in other genres. Word count for novels and books is something i dont think about too often until i travel to a writers conference, and then someone asks a simple, innocent question. Word count for famous novels, in ascending order by number of words. Ive read individual stories from some of the collections, but bazaar is the only one ive read cover to cover. Word counts for chapter books and middle grade can range from 1,50030,000 or more. Your chapter length has to work well with the overall word count of the book short chapters create an even distribution of both content and action. And remember, keeping to word counts is important, but what makes or breaks your chances with a.

Based on this list compiled by nicole humphrey cook. Word counts of the most popular books in the world. Word count is a direct way to measure the length of a novel in a manner. Tolkiens the lord of the rings trilogy has an enormous word count, with the longest clocking in at over 175,000 words.

Generally a 50,000 word novel would be the minimum word count. This is due to the audience youre reaching preferring that length. Even though psalms has more contributors than any other book of the bible, it turns out that two other books are much longer than psalms. There are no hard and fast rules when it comes to word counts, and different sources are going to tell you different things. Ive put together word counts for every book of the bible. Word count estimates are not guaranteed to be accurate. An approximate word count round numbers based on what your wp tells you enables them to estimate costs and other factors involved in printing a book.