How Long Should a Novel Be?
There are so many novel genres; there’s romance, Sci-Fi, biographies, children’s novels, and many more categories.
The length of a novel depends on the type of book. Children’s novels produce about 60,000 words or less depending on the age group. The famous Harry Potter books’ word counts range from 76,944 – 257,045 words. The whole series’ word count is over one million words. Adult fiction novels typically have a word count of 75,000 to 100,000.
Chapter Lengths
The purpose of having chapter breaks is to help the reader digest everything they read in that section, as well as to provide suspense. The length between chapters ranges from 3,000 to 5,000 words for a book of 80,000 to 100,000 words.
Word Count & Page Length
A prime factor of book size is the word count. No matter how much other variables are adjusted, if the manuscript’s word count falls too far short you will struggle to make page length. If you only have 50,000 words instead of 95,000, then you’ll have a problem if the book was announced as being 288 pages in length, as the most it can be stretched to is 160 pages. The average number of words per page for a standard 6”x9” novel is 400 words per page without pictures or illustrations. Knowing this, the chapters would be 7-8 pages in length.
Include in the book’s interior count, the title page, other titles written when applicable, title with author page, Copyright, Dedication, Contents, Foreword, and Prologue pages. If producing the novel as a cloth cover book, you may want to incorporate a dust jacket. Typically on dust jackets you can place the foreword on the back and the flaps can include a snippet of the story and author introduction.
Novels are typically printed on wood free or opaque papers. Once you’ve determined the page count, the next step would be the book style. Styles typically are hardcover or perfect bound. If you are seeking printing options, please contact PRC Book Printing for a quote either with our USA or China plant to provide you excellent pricing and ideas to make the novel stand out. Call us today at 888.659.8320 or email: info@prcbookprinting.com and a representative will get back to you soon!
