Two weeks ago I wrote about the verb to be plaguing me. Now the monkey on my back is obsessing over my WIP’s (work in progress) word count. Word count has always been a bit of a sore subject for me. I always felt like my short stories came out too long and in my previous two attempts at novel-writing they’ve come up too short.
I’ve spent many hours over the years googling how long a novel should be. Most of them say things like “there is no should” and “however long it takes to tell your story”. I can’t think of anything less helpful. I appreciate the bloggers give number ranges, but this information is often contradictory. Some say a novel is never less than 70,000 words. While others insist on somewhere between 50,000 and 60,000 for a first time author. Short of taking my favorite novels and physically counting the words, I’ve been at a loss to answer this question (which lets face it is probably just a tricksy form of procrastination). Until I discovered AR Book Finder, a site that will give you the word count for almost all novels.
Alison Doherty 