Word Count

I tallied up a rough word count of my book today and it's looking like I will finish up the first draft with roughly100-105 thousand words. Considering I have quite a bit of revision to do of the first half of the book, I expect that will come down some, so I am very happy I am in the right range.

Your average 300 page book has roughly 75-80,000 words. Anything over 110,000 starts to veer into big, Tolkienesque territory and is really hard to get published as a first time author. The sweet spot is between 80 and 100k. Too short, and your novel may not have enough meat. Too long, and it not only risks dragging on, but it costs more to produce.


This morning, I finished chapter 37. I had orignally expected there to be about 38-40 chapters, but I had to break up a scene that was getting too long into a couple of chapters and I have tweaked my ending to create one with more oomph. That change presented itself during the writing of the last few chapters and Feels Right. It will be better for the story, but will add a couple of chapters. However, if I go more than 44 chapters at my current average of about 2500 words per chapter, it will add another 17,500 words on top of my current to date total of 94,000. That is pushing it, even with revisions coming, so I need to wrap this up soon.

The good news is that the characters are telling me I am on the right track again. So is Loving Wife, who is now rubbing her hands together gleefully asking 'what's next, what's next' in that hurry up and write mode that is so encouraging.

I also finally killed off one of the bad guys, which was satisfying, but in the sense of 'cool, that story arc is wrapped up' as opposed to the gleeful sigh of satisfaction that came from Loving Wife. Funny how being on the other end of the story changes perspective.

In any case, it's getting close. Being back to work has slowed me down to writing only on weekends and occasional evenings, but nothing can really slow down my momentum too much now.

Unless I am one of the bad guys and am about to get killed off. :)

Thanks for reading.