Ya book average word count

Jan 08, 2018 this article on writers digest also suggests a length of around 100115,000, and takes a good look at desirable word count ranges for different genres. Word count picture book, middle grade, ya when i finished my first middlegrade novel, last in a long line of rebels, it sat on my desk at 68,000 words. They contain only a few illustrations and tend to be written in series that repeat a simple plot format. Everything you need to know about novel word counts nathan. Middlegrade novels can range from 10,000 to 30,000 words, and young adult novels can range from 25,000 to 50,000. For novels specifically in the young adult genre, the typical range is between 55,000 79,999 words. For more ya examples, including more dystopias, check out this list on brett orrs site. Of course, there are always exceptions, and if you think your longer novel is worth it with each word being important, than, well go for it.

This just goes to show how there are no rules set in stone when it comes to length. Now, they dont offer word count or running time for books, but they do have a search api. May 14, 2018 literary agent paula munier says a 90,000 word count is the sweet spot for debut fiction. Minimum realistic word count of nonfiction book writing. If the word count of twilight is disregarded, the average becomes around 88,625.

All we have to do is use the wp tool that shows word count. Twilight has 24 titled chapters, or 26 if you count the preface and epilogue, and about 4580 words per chapter. That said, the average word count for science fiction and fantasy novels generally lies between 100,000 and 115,000. When converting character counts to words, a measure of 5 or 6 characters to a word is generally used for english. This means your memoir will average between 150 and 265 pages. Virtually every book i try to shop by a debut author thats any longer than thatregardless of categoryreceives the same response from editors. My own past research on ya word count turned up 5080,000 as an average guideline. If youre working on a novellength book, aim for 50,000 words at the very least but its better to aim for 90,000. But the word count of a chapter matters if you want your story to flow right. This is due in large part to the variety of subgenres within it and the trend for a book series with an ever greater word count. Generally, 50,000 would be considered the minimum word count, and ideally a novel should be over 70,000 words. I once entered a competition that set a maximum word limit of 80,000 for young adult novels and 100,000 for adult novels. The expert writing style and pace makes the words fly from the pages. Harry potter and the sorcerers stone has 17 chapters with titles, and about 4560 words per chapter.

Most young adult novels fall between 55,000 and 70,000 words. Writing towards a word count might not work for everybody, but having a rough goal in mind certainly helps me when im sketching out chapters and undertaking my first draft. Nonfiction wordcounts sit between 70,000120,000 words. Most middle grade novels are between 40,000 and 69,000 words long.

Word counts for children, mg, ya, and adult books, by genre august 7, 2017 august 3, 2018 sarahnicolas ive been getting a lot of word count questions from pitch wars hopefuls, so i though id write everything out in a post for ease and convenience. Young adult fiction because these are younger readers, the word count for ya novels is between 50,000 and 70,000 words, although the harry potter series shows that you break that norm with exceptional storytelling. Chapter books are transitionary books that are broken down into short simple chapters to prepare young children for reading novels. How many words does it take to write a young adult book. This is due to the audience youre reaching preferring that length. Oct 28, 2015 middle grade word count is typically 20,000 to 55,000. For a firsttime novelist, it might be a little hard to pitch your ya manuscript to editors if your word count exceeds that number. In 2011, the lists average length peaked at 467 pages.

This will help determine what kind of length readers expect in popular novels, and also will give me a word count goal for writing the scenes and assignments. Coyne uses the nanowrimo wordcount length of 50,000 words for his examples, calling 50,000 words a good foundation to build upon. Word counts may also be used to calculate measures of readability and to measure typing and reading speeds usually in words per minute. To find pretty much any kids ya word count, you can use the ar bookfinder. I have often looked this up and got different results, which makes it very confusing. Apr 23, 2018 this post covers why word count matters for novels, the standard word count ranges for various genres, and the word counts of some famous novels. Perhaps more than any other, ya is the one category where word count is very flexible.

From these numbers, we can establish some guidelines. Publishers want to know the overall length of your book. The fact is that an average of 5565,000 words is probably a good choice. Rowlings recordbreaking series began with two titles on the high end of that spectrum and finished with five that left the guidelines in the dust. The word count range for young adult is 55,000 to 90,000. Click librarian or teacher and then search for books like yours click on the titles to get all kinds of info about them, including wordcount. Which is totally understandable, since length can be an important factor that agents and publishers look at when they receive your query letter. Sep 20, 2019 the average fantasy novel should have between 50,000 and 150,000 words. However there are some interesting findings in the word counts. As you can see, established authors get much more flexibility when it comes to the length of their book. This video is all about word counts for your novel, in particular word counts for ya novels.

Literary agent paula munier says a 90,000 word count is the sweet spot for debut fiction. Famous novels have been extremely long, like 530,000 words for vic. But for mainstream ya it is always best to stick to under 80k. Writing middle grade a look at the numbers hannah holt. If youre writing a young adult fantasy novel, you should keep your word count below 90,000 words or 300 book pages.

Search for word count totals in books word counters. Novels for adult readers fall between 80,000 and 120,000 words. It seems like ya novels are getting longer and longer nowadays, but maybe my attention span is getting shorter. Most young adult novels fall between 50,000 and 80,000 words. The highest word count was 115,000, the lowest was 47,000, and the average was 75,000. We recommend memoirs be between 45,000 to 80,000 words in order to maintain intrigue and reduce intimidation. Finish the draft first, then worry about word count. We all know of outliers within each genre that have been published well under, or well over, these word counts. Recently, though, the harry potter series and christopher paolinis inheritance trilogy have offered page counts exceeding what anyone though middlegrade readers could handle. That gives us a rough range of 61,00089,000 words, with about 3 out of 4 queried ya books falling into that range. 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. Nov 21, 2016 a novel is usually defined as anything over 40,000 words. I agree that it seems like for a debut author, the agent really looks at that word count. Better to have solid, clear information than rambling to make a page count.

When you take a closer look at recent data you can see that young adult novels vary in length anywhere from 25,000 100,000 words in length for many published authors. If the text is already as tight and economical as you can make it, and every sentence counts, then the agent will notice that rather than the word count. How many chapters will you need before you reach your target word count. Younger still, middle grade fiction ages 912 should. Try not to completely tether yourself to word counts. Ive written a monthly column for an online ezine for six years. Word counts for children, mg, ya, and adult books, by. Oct 26, 2018 discover what size your book should be and if thats comparable to the standard book sizes in publishing. For young adult fiction, the word count is once again lower, with the ideal being 55,000 80,000 words. On average, young adult novels usually fall around 55,000 and 70,000 words. With fun, lighthearted, simple middle grade youll want to stay around the 20k30k word count range. A closer look at word counts for young adult novels.

For debut books in this field the average word count tends to be 35k and it has therefore. Ya manuscripts can have a word count anywhere from 55k to 90k. Some people will let you know that 2,500 words is about average per chapter, while. The longest is the order of the phoenix with a word count of 257,000 words. The word count is the number of words in a document or passage of text. This may particularly be the case in academia, legal proceedings, journalism and advertising. The average nonfiction book is about 50,000 to 75,000 words, which is about 153 to 230 ebook pages. Book page count calculator how many pages is my novel.

Although, if its over 10 words, some may call it an. A minimum count for a nonfiction ebook is about 10,000 words, as long as the content is solid. I have therefore made some averages, based on what ive heard from publishers and agents at childrens book events, and from research and reading. The hunger games is more of a ya dystopia than a ya fantasy but i included it for interests sake. Well, while the accelerated reader program is lame in a lot of ways, this is a very handy tool. Neither too long nor too short, this book length signals a novelists competency and knowledge of the publishing market to prospective agents and editors. Does the average scene word count lessen for a yachildrens novel and increase for, say, an adult thriller. My current wip is young adult, so i compiled a somewhat random list of ya novels by debut authors and looked up the book s word count. Harry potter and the sorcerers stone is about 77,500 words total.

A reasonable word count for a nonfiction book would be between 30,000 to 50,000 words. Whether your book is considered chapter book or upper middle grade will depend on the age of your characters, and the subject matter. Does this mean that every chapter must end up somewhere in this range. Id guesstimate that nonfiction books generally yes, this is very rough run perhaps 150450 pages, and at about 350 wdpage that works out to something like 50150k words. Jun 15, 2017 this is a general list of age categories and word counts for childrens books. Here is everything writers need to know about novel word counts. With books like twilight at 118,975 words and divergent at 105,143 words, this. Feb 09, 2015 word counts of popular ya books as i started drafting my new wip a ya scifi thriller i began wondering what word count i should aim for. On average, there are about 300 words per page in a book. I dont know how to be descriptive as possible without taking away from the story. In the first book i tried to write my chapters were about 500 words long. The point of this blog is to show that not necessarily all ya books you see have larger than life word counts.

On the upper end, a novel over 110,000 words is considered an epic. Word count for book series the first book in each series below was the authors first. Right now, when it comes to novellength word count, its all about 90,000 words. Firstly, most ya books are far longer than i expected. With books like twilight at 118,975 words and divergent at 105,143 words, this genre has been trending higher. The average wordcount for adult fiction is between 70,000 to 120,000 words. This 90,000word guideline for how many words in a novel is just that, a guideline. Oct 18, 2017 therefore, the word count of a novel is crucial if you want your book to be fit for publication. The harry potter books are young adult titles, and ya publishers generally look for manuscripts in the 50,000 to 80,000word range. Youre writing your first novel, and you know you must shoot for around 80 to 95 thousand words. Chapter books would be on the lower end, while upper middle grade would be fine in the upper range.

Thats the level where publishers may suggest dividing a story into multiple volumes. Writing for young adults a look at the numbers hannah holt. On average, when writing a memoir should not exceed 90,000 words and that is a stretch when it comes to memoir word count. Upper middle grade can hit in the 50k word count range possibly longer, if its something really special. A books word count does matter and if you get it wrong, this can impact your. Word count picture book, middle grade, ya lisa lewis tyre.

Also remember because there are a bunch of new novel imprints opening their doors, a novella is 40k or less. What is a reasonable estimate for the minimum length, in word count, for a nonfiction book. Word counting may be needed when a text is required to stay within certain numbers of words. Aug 05, 2019 all of these are average book word count ranges and should not be taken as the definitive word count you must reach in your book.

Recently, though, the harry potter series and christopher paolinis inheritance trilogy have offered page counts exceeding what. Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price of a translation job. As you write more and more your word count will probably go up for each chapter because you become a stronger writer and are able to go more in depth in each chapter. If youve read our related article on how many words are in a novel youll recall that the typical word count for a novel according to is 80,000 to 109,000 words. Know your content, know your mainline pitch and some possible permutations, create a highlevel outline, write a compelling chapter and sell that. Of course, when youre writing the first draft of your story, you want to just get your words out on paper. Do check your comparable titlesrecent debuts onlyto make sure your story falls in that range. Book 1 of my ya fantasy is 99k trimmed down from 107k. Nobodys stopping you, of course especially if you think your 100,000word novel justifies the word count. Each genre and subgenre has its own word count range. A novel is usually defined as anything over 40,000 words. This is a lot harder because its not a specific field im receiving back i have to scrape the results and do some crazy parsing of the data.

I thought most would hover around the 85k mark, but instead, almost every novel in the list was over 100k words. The golden compass by philip pullman 112,815 words, prisoner of azkaban by jk rowling 106,821 words, and enders game by orson scott card 100,609 words. My upperlevel ya novel is 211 pages, 61,078 words, tnr 12 pt. All of these are average book word count ranges and should not be. 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. Use these numbers as a baseline for your writing goals. A novel is usually defined as anything over 40000 words.

The average mean word count was about 73,000 words. Once you know what your book will be about, its time to start planning the structure of the story. Here is what i found in order from least words to most words. Jan 18, 2012 list of popular ya novels word counts if youre like me, you obsess over the word count of your novel. Your guide to book word counts fiction and nonfiction. Of course, rules are made to be broken, especially in literature. There are exceptions, like ya books that exceed 250,000 words, but. As with higher word count books, however, good writing is a must. Books with much shorter sections become bestsellers all the time. 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.

Young adult fiction allows for a lot of flexibility in word count. The word count at big five publishers had a slightly narrower range. Until i discovered ar book finder, a site that will give you the word count for almost all novels. Like a general fiction novel, a good target word count for a memoir is 80,000 words. I just finished my first chapter to my book, but the word count is a little less than words. However, the true word count depends on the category in which youre writing. But, most nonfiction publishers want to be sold the concept, and therefore be able to discuss the direction of the project, before you write the book. Most middle grade novels are not pitched as a series. Since 2011, the average length of a bestseller has dropped steadily from year to year. Word count for young adult books the word count range for young adult is 55,000 to 90,000. Oct 23, 2017 more on agents later, for now lets look at how many novels a typical young adult author writes before selling something. The editor plans that space and can work with the 500word difference.

It should be enough to communicate your message effectively. What will happen in each chapter, and how much has to happen before you move on to the next chapter. List of popular ya novels word counts if youre like me, you obsess over the word count of your novel. How many words in a young adult book 60,000 90,000. You can see there is a lot of variation in word length, especially in epic high fantasy, where books can stretch beyond 200,000 words or sink as low as 50,000. I keep hearing that houses are looking for books around 200 pages long. Although, if its over 110,000 words, some may call it an epic, not a novel.