Word count of a book

Unfortunately, they dont offer word count so ive created an algorithm based on the number of pages, genre, and the dimensions of the book. There are several methods for determining the word count of a given book. When it gets closer to 1,000, editors and agents may shy away. Of course, rules are made to be broken, especially in literature. Pencilthin books on narrow topics that are under 50,000 words are quite common. That was the formula in the good old days when courier. Shorter novels such as fahrenheit 451, the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, the great gatsby, and slaughterhousefive are between 4050,000 words. In some cases, these books will have no words at all, such as for the very small child who likes to feel the fluffy cotton tail of a bunny or push the squeaker for a duck quack.

Better to have solid, clear information than rambling to make a page count. In contrast, word count is finite and usually i can calculate book length with about 99% accuracy in part because also included in any calculation is a count of figures, tables, etc. Neither too long nor too short, this book length signals a novelists competency and knowledge of the publishing market to prospective agents and editors. If a page is 500 words on an ipad, and 250 words on a kindle, it might be only 120 words on a phone. Word count is a direct way to measure the length of a novel in a manner unaffected by variations of format and page size. For childrens fiction, the general rule is the younger the audience the shorter the. Word count for famous novels organized commonplace book. But chapter word count is something that you want to keep in. Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price of a translation job. Word count for famous novels organized by hawthorn mineart, under books, writing. Book page count calculator how many pages is my novel. Some 6090k ya books get classified as hilo, but i dont think they were specifically. Between 80,000 and 89,999 words is a good range you should be aiming for.

It should be enough to communicate your message effectively. Find out how long it will take you to read any book by using our book word count search. A novelist of my acquaintance insists that the only way to estimate the number of words in a book is to multiply the number of pages by 250. The word count is the number of words in a document or passage of text. I remember reading some westerns in high school and, if i. Length of a book is typically associated with its sizespecifically page count leading many to assume the largest and thickest book equates to its length. The average across a sample of 50 books in august 2015 showed 172 words per kindle edition normalized page.

Virtually every book i try to shop by a debut author thats any longer than thatregardless of categoryreceives the same response from editors. Therefore, the word count of a novel is crucial if you want your book to be fit for publication. You would be wise to come close to these suggested. Word counting may be needed when a text is required to stay within certain numbers of words. Literary agent paula munier says a 90,000 word count is the sweet spot for debut fiction. Amazon estimates a page count in an ebook to be around 187 words. For most publishers, a book is novellength when its between 50,000 and 110,000 words. Before our book page count calculator, you had to dig around through multiple sources to figure out how many words per page for your exact font size and then do the math. For average word counts based on genre, see this handy reference. The hunger games has a word count of 99,750 and my utility calculates it at 98,916.

A reasonable word count for a nonfiction book would be between 30,000 to 50,000 words. In 2016s list, ron chernows 816page alexander hamilton managed to crack the top spot. The average nonfiction book is about 50,000 to 75,000 words, which is about 153 to 230 ebook pages. The actual word count for harry potter and the sorcerers stone is 78,792 and my utility calculates 77,876. Word count for famous novels, in ascending order by number of words.

There are a few book word count guidelines for each genre, but these arent hard and fast rules. That said, this figure differs from book to book and organization to. Word count tool is a word counter that provides an extensive statistics about the word count, character count, the number of characters without spaces. For you dear authors, the only time you should take note about the word count is probably when you are hiring someone for editing and formatting because the more word count you have, the more the service is going to cost you.

But depending on the ereading device and the font size setting, it varies significantly between a phone, a tablet, or a kindle. For nonfiction books, word count guidelines are more flexible, sometimes even double the word counts listed here. Never pad your manuscript just to meet a word count guideline. Right now, when it comes to novellength word count, its all about 90,000 words. The book genre you choose will have a substantial impact on your author brand. Word count estimates are not guaranteed to be accurate. Compressing a very exciting scene so you can meet your chapter word count target is also not going to do you any favors. Some genres like science fiction can be much longer and spend 1,000s of words on worldbuilding. And remember, keeping to word counts is important, but what makes or breaks your chances with a publisher is the quality of your manuscript. Of course, when youre writing the first draft of your story, you want to just get your words out on paper. Search for word count totals in books word counters. There is no definitive word count guide for nonfiction books due to the many subgenres.

If youre working on a novellength book, aim for 50,000 words. Once you know your word count, follow one of our two methods below to estimate your page count. Put simply, the sweet spot for a novels word count is generally said to be around 8090k. 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. Deconstructing five spooky picture books with spoilers and word counts. For the book hatchet, the actual word count is 41,672 and i give you. Calculate book page count using word count for book design. Youll use the word count in your word document to calculate book page count. When writing a longer book that is aimed at 12yearolds and could maybe be considered tween, using the term upper middle grade is advisable. Its too much hassle and timeconsuming time you couldve spent refining and perfecting your book content. First of all, find your word count in word by opening your document and looking at the bottom left of your screen. Students, teachers, parents, and librarians can search in english or spanish using criteria such as atos book level or a lexile measure, interest level, title, author, fictionnonfiction, subject, awardwinners, state lists, ccss.

The longest is the order of the phoenix with a word count of 257,000 words. This may particularly be the case in academia, legal proceedings, journalism and advertising. As for nonfiction books, the standard bestsellers have word counts similar to adult novels. This is a 100% safe range for literary, mainstream, womens. We have compiled a list of the daily word counts of famous authors and what they had to say about writing every day what is a word count. This isnt to say that long books are no longer succeeding. Shorter novels such as fahrenheit 451, the hitchhikers. Most young adult novels fall between 55,000 and 70,000 words. Amazon ebook page length by genre kindle page length. At times the readers of books may be interested in discovering how many words they read.

Fleshing out an imagined historical world lends itself to a higher word count, so historical fiction tends to be closer to 100,000 words. Novelty books include popups, puzzles, pulltabs and other interactive features. Coyne uses the nanowrimo word count length of 50,000 words for his examples, calling 50,000 words a good foundation to build upon. While its important that every story find its natural length, it takes time to develop an instinct as. Excluding endnotes and index, the book has about 200 pages of text, which means its total word count is about 74,000 words. 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.

Your guide to book word counts fiction and nonfiction. In 2017, the downward trend has continued, with an average book length of 273 pages. 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. Like a general fiction novel, a good target word count for a memoir is 80,000 words. How to find out the number of words in a book pen and. 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 older readers. Picture book word count, and other rules that are meant to. 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. However, there is a wide range of acceptable word counts for nonfiction books. Here is what 187 words looks like in microsoft word. Each page contains about 34 lines, with an average word count of 11 words per line, thus 375 words per page. A minimum count for a nonfiction ebook is about 10,000 words, as long as the content is solid. According to reedsy, the general word count by genre are. Search for a book, tell us how fast you read, and start reading.

If youre working on a novellength book, aim for 50,000 words at the very least but its better to aim for 90,000. This tool also reports the number of syllables, monosyllabic words, polysyllabic words, sentences, paragraphs, unique words, short words, long words. It will also help you understand what your target audience i. By using these three options to more accurately define your writing, the words per page calculator should provide a better estimate on how many words you need to write to fill a page. The daily word counts of 39 famous authors writers write. These include using published information about the book to determine an exact word count, estimating the number of words based on industry standards and. If there is an average, 60,000 words to 80,000 words are probably the sweet spot. Do you want to publish a wide format book with inspiring quotes down the side margins. 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. Generally, there are 300 words per typed doublespaced page, using a 12 point font. Based on this list compiled by nicole humphrey cook. The word count to aim for with this type of book is usually between 500 and 600 words. I think it stands as the longest fantasy trilogy to date.

In the opposite direction, it can give a more accurate estimate of how many pages you have created if you only know the word count. During the introductory month of the new system, the conversion of kenpc into the actual number of words in the book actual word count showed significant differences from one book to the other. If you are an author of a book or know of a book s accurate wordcount, contact me. If yours is too short, restructure it and add more tightly written stuff. While the idea of chapters in the 3,000 to 5,000 word range is a good guideline when roughing out your book s structure, it isnt a rule, and the story itself should be the primary deciding factor. As a general rule of thumb, a novel falls somewhere between word count ranges of 50,000 words and 100,000 words. The average wordcount for adult fiction is between 70,000 to 120,000 words. But the word count of a chapter matters if you want your story to flow right. However, the drop in the overall average length of bestsellers over the last 7 years points to a marked. At a writers conference i recently attended, publishing. But while the length of a novel is to a large extent up to its writer, lengths may also vary by subgenre.