Tonya asked: What are normal word counts for different genres?
This varies per genre and publishing house, but a basic breakdown that should be pretty close is as follows...
Young Adult: 80-90k (used to be much less but with the rise of Harry Potter and Twilight, publishers of YA are realizing that teens want longer reads that are more fleshed out)
Historicals: (85-100+k) and usually on the longer end of that scale. Historicals can get away with being well above 100k, whereas that's pretty much a no-no in other genres.
Contemporary romance: 75-90k
Category romance (like Love Inspired novels): 60-65k (Heartsong Presents are shorter, more like 55k I believe)
Suspense/Romantic Suspense: 85-90k
Thriller: 85-90k
Women's Fiction: 85-90k
Scribble Chicks, if you have heard differently lately, please let me know in the comments! This is what I understand the market to be right now but of course I could be off.
Hope this helps, Tonya!! =)
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i've always wondered about that...thanks for doing the post!
ReplyDeleteThanks Betsy! As for your reply to my last comment, maybe I'll just have to write the first draft like you said with my heart and then think about character, plot, and dialogue after! the problem I have is I keep having different ideas to do with it, i might be able to come up with two different stories!
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing these numbers. I know a lot of writers fret about them.
ReplyDeleteSo far none of my finished novels fit in your categories. Chapter books and middle grade are entirely different creatures!
Yes, this seems about right to me. I've heard 75-100K is the average norm. My first novel ended up being 75K (it's a contemporary). My second is 98K (also a contemporary).
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