Word count chapter books

Childrens chapter books word count age 69 word count. These are basic learning books that creatively teach colors, numbers or simple, fun stories for bedtime. Youll use the word count in your word document to calculate book page count. Once you know your word count, follow one of our two methods below to estimate your page count. Word count for famous novels, in ascending order by number of words. There are some variations between versions with includedexcluded text and verses, however, for the purpose of establishing the relative lengths of each book, these counts are. That left me with 66 logos word lists, each giving me every originallanguage word in a given book of the bible. There are also some subgenres that have slightly different conventions. However, there are averages and rough word counts expected by publishers.

Oct 27, 2018 chapter length matters more than you think. Jun 05, 2017 childrens book manuscript chapter length consistency is what sort of keeps the engine of your pacing going. The eight harry potter books have an impressive combined word count of over 1 million words. I use the target average of 1,500 words per chapter. Heres what you need to know about this often overlooked. This may particularly be the case in academia, legal proceedings, journalism and advertising. Not easy to keep the pacing up over such an extended narrative, and the worry is that the authorespecially a debut authoris not up to the challenge. Can be publisher specific, ranging from 3,000 to absolute max 5,000. Manuscripts can range from about 5,000 words to about 15,000 words, max. 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. I built one logos word list like this for every single book of the bible.

Jun 26, 2018 i have found the website dogobooks to be the most useful place to check the word count of popular books for kids. A minimum count for a nonfiction ebook is about 10,000 words, as long as the content is solid. Your guide to book word counts fiction and nonfiction. I got blood rites and death masks in the wrong order, they should be the other way round. Based on this list compiled by nicole humphrey cook. The hobbit has more unique words and a higher unique word density than both the silmarillion and each volume in the lord of the rings.

Some bookstores designate these as for kids 912 but i would say readers are mostly 68. For the book hatchet, the actual word count is 41,672 and i give you. Word count for novels and childrens books at the guide to literary agents blog. Wordcounter will help to make sure its word count reaches a specific requirement or stays within a certain limit. The former promises more intrigue in the next chapter. The word count range for each age level is only a guideline. Hi, im a little confused about the word count for chapter books. Still in doubt about a desirable word count for your novel. Harry potter and the sorcerers stone has an average of 4,560 words per chapter. While its important that every story find its natural length, it takes time to develop an instinct as. This averages to about 22 to 23 chapters per novel, with the average chapter length around 4,280 words. Jun 27, 2019 chapter books will come in at the lower end of the spectrum, while middlegrade books meant for older readers may even slightly exceed 55,000 words. When writing for the younger ages especially, every word must count. If youre working on a novellength book, aim for 50,000 words at the very least but its better to aim for 90,000.

For more information on word counts for childrens book, check out this post. What is a good way to get the word count of a kindle book. Chapter books are for more independent readers who are making the bridge between picture books and early readers and middle grade. Middlegrade novels are generally 20,000 to 55,000 words. Apr 23, 2018 there are no hard and fast rules when it comes to word counts, and different sources are going to tell you different things. King james version bible breakdown books, chapters, verses. Heres what you need to know about this often overlooked genre. Armed with these word counts, i now have a range of lengths that have been proven popular.

As a nonfiction writer myself, i know this is tough. Word counts for childrens books i received a request awhile ago to do a post on word counts for different age categories in childrens lit. Well, youll put the book down when you get to the end of this chapter, you. On a scale of one bad to ten excellent, chapter books rate their agents overall as an 8. At a writers conference i recently attended, publishing veteran jane friedman said 80,000 words is good for most fiction, below 60,000 isnt novel length territory, and above 120,000 is likely too much. The hunger games has a word count of 99,750 and my utility calculates it at 98,916. If youre working on a novellength book, aim for 50,000 words.

The hunger games uses 3,700word chapters, dividing each chapter into three parts. The kjv bible breakdown by books, chapters, verses and word counts. While the idea of chapters in the 3,000 to 5,000 word range is a good guideline when roughing out your book s structure, it isnt a rule, and the story itself should be the primary deciding factor. And as you can see, it varies, depending on the story. Your best bet is to figure out what books yours is comparable to, then sit down and count the words on 23 typical pages. 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. Since opinions vary greatly, i did some research to verify the numbers in my head. However, we do not suggest writing a novel of 500,000 words unless you as established as stephen king is.

Calculate book page count using word count for book design. Of course, figures differ depending on which publisher you ask, so the following figures are merely approximations derived from various sources. Word count for famous novels organized by hawthorn mineart, under books, writing. But overall, heres my own rough stab at word counts by genre. Better to have solid, clear information than rambling to make a page count. Word counting may be needed when a text is required to stay within certain numbers of words. So should i stay with this word count, or try to bring the word count down.

Once upon a time amazon offered text stats for a majority of their books, which included word count. The silmarillion and the lord of the rings both introduce many times more new concepts, characters and locations which makes them more complex. Mgs are usually around 2545k, even longer if its a fantasy. Harry potter and the sorcerers stone has 17 chapters with titles, and about 4560 words per chapter. From a conference, paula sadler had given out a handout that said the word. There are plenty of books that purposefully play with the word counts of their chapters. What follows is a rough guide to book length expectations in certain genres. Coyne uses the nanowrimo word count length of 50,000 words for his examples, calling 50,000 words a good foundation to build upon.

We are also going to look at how harry potter is comparable to other young adult novels in regards to word count. The average chapter word count of these novels falls within the 2,0005,000 range. Everything you need to know about novel word counts nathan. As for nonfiction books, the standard bestsellers have word counts similar to adult novels.

Sep 20, 2019 as you can see, word count for science fiction books vary widely. Twilight has 24 titled chapters, or 26 if you count the preface and epilogue, and about 4580 words per chapter. Many of these books are written in rhyme or in a simple singsong meter that is catchy and fun. The word count 788,280 is based on the kjv and seems to be almost exactly as wed expect see our page on how many words in the bible for more information on this. To find pretty much any kids ya word count, you can use the ar bookfinder.

For example, if an author has to write a minimum or maximum amount of words for an article, essay, report, story, book, paper, you name it. How many words in each book of the bible the holy word. The word count is the number of words in a document or passage of text. Make a list of 15 recently published comparative titles. As with everything else when it comes to writing a book, these are only guidelinesnot rules.

However, there is a wide range of acceptable word counts for nonfiction books. In any of these books, some chapters are longer than others. Word counts for chapter books and middle grade can range from 1,50030,000 or more. Oct 18, 2017 in any case, to see how authors use this tactic to set their pacing, we also mapped out the word count of every chapter in four famous books. A novella is usually between 20,000 and 50,000 words. The actual word count for harry potter and the sorcerers stone is 78,792 and my utility calculates 77,876. Smashwords gives a precise word count for each and every b.

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. However, this does not necessarily mean it is more difficult to read. Hazen here was my situationi had two books published, a picture book and. I definitely notice when a chapter is a lot shorter or a lot longer than sort of what has been established. The best thing that you can do is look over comparable books and try to judge word count by their size, average wordspage, and illustration content. If the word count of twilight is disregarded, the average becomes around 88,625.

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. Even if you think you have a great early reader idea, it has to be a very precise fit for a publishers established vocabsentenceword count. Ali, 9000 words is on the upper end of the chapter book spectrum. Barbara seulings chapter book, oh no, its robert, dives right into the type of conflict the. Oct 03, 2017 on a scale of one bad to ten excellent, chapter books rate their agents overall as an 8. Some chapter book authors have chosen to lengthen each chapter book they write in a given series, with the idea that the readers comprehension ability and attention span will increase with every reading. There are also fantastic nonfiction examples found in this category such as the i survived books. Picture book word count, and other rules that are meant to. The authors had sold between 10 copies and 2 million copies of their chapter books.

For this reason, there really is no average word count within the range. Counting chickens a few words about word counts at hope vestergaards site. Trim size resembles paperback books and finished books tend to go from 100 to 160 pages, with black and white spot illustrations throughout. Obviously, the examples under each category are above and below what is generally accepted. In todays market, most chapter books are about 15,00020,000 words. Realize it over the maximum word count for erotic, science fictionfantasy genre. Word count for famous novels organized commonplace book. 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. Pencilthin books on narrow topics that are under 50,000 words are quite common.

Oct 22, 2010 younger chapter books will be simpler some will call them easy chapter books, but you can get pretty sophisticated for older chapter books. While the idea of chapters in the 3,000 to 5,000word range is a good guideline when roughing out your books structure, it isnt a rule, and the story itself should be the primary deciding factor. A reasonable word count for a nonfiction book would be between 30,000 to 50,000 words. A breakdown of the total number of books, chapters verses and words found in the king james version of the holy bible. So that usually includes everything from chapter books, to middle grade, to young adult novels.

I have found the website dogobooks to be the most useful place to check the word count of popular books for kids. Here you go, i made sure to count from chapter one till the last word of the last chapter, also keep in mind that different programs count words differently so your results may vary. Martins a song of ice and fire series, is the lengthiest of the five currently released books, with a word count of almost 415. When converting character counts to words, a measure of 5 or 6 characters to a word is generally used for english. Chapter books may have multilayered plots and problems, and even subplots. In this article, were going to look at how many words are in the harry potter series. Writing chapter books a look at the numbers hannah holt. The average novel is usually between 80,000 and 100,000 words.

Word count is commonly used by translators to determine the price of a translation job. Stephen king word count 112263 274,672 bag of bones 203,3 black house 252,270 blockade billy 15,917 carrie 60,718 cell 121,931 christine 193,602 cujo 121,150 cycle of the werewolf 15,955 desperation 195,011 doctor sleep. Im not sure if im pushing the word count over, been trying cut back the word count. Many chapter books are single character or subject based and they may contain a simple subplot or two. Unfortunately, amazon recently removed that feature as well. Writing young chapter books heres what you need to know about this often overlooked genre.

Aug 03, 2017 there are no hardandfast rules when it comes to what word count a novel in a particular genre should be. You wont get exact, but youre wondering whether 35k is reasonable, so you dont need exact. Apr 08, 2019 word counts for chapter books and middle grade can range from 1,50030,000 or more. Chapter books span a wide audience and reading levels vary. Still, it can be hard to tell the difference since both easy readers and chapter books have chapters. Aug 05, 2019 for most publishers, a book is novellength when its between 50,000 and 110,000 words. After that, your agent will be able to help you more. But more than word count, its content and reading difficulty that will better define what you have. And when im reading, i definitely notice, you know, with my editorial clients, i have manuscripts in front of me all the time. How to write early readers, easy chapter books, and chapter. It is feasible to count the number of words in a published chapter. Also, the chapters are evenly divided into 3 titled parts. Though the average word count of a chapter is around 2,000 5,000 words, it all depends on your story.

Although amazon stopped offering this for new books several years ago, the feature still remained for older books. For average word counts based on genre, see this handy reference. Word counts may also be used to calculate measures of readability and to measure typing and reading speeds usually in words per minute. May 15, 2011 well, while the accelerated reader program is lame in a lot of ways, this is a very handy tool. T he indie author chris fox coined the term potato chip chapters for easilydigestible book chapters of a certain size. From picture books to ya information to get you started at. King james version bible breakdown books, chapters. These word counts are my personal references they are not official, and do not include back matter, which is bonus material for the reader or information geared for parents, teachers, or older readers.

It should be enough to communicate your message effectively. And, rather than giving a word count, i want you to think about who its for and what its for you want a clear structure, your reader wants to know what to expect, but there is no single best way to do this. The average nonfiction book is about 50,000 to 75,000 words, which is about 153 to 230 ebook pages. Discover the sweet spot for your chapters word count in this post. Compressing a very exciting scene so you can meet your chapter word count target is also not going to do you any favors. When i started writing three years ago, the mg word count i kept hearing was no more than 30,000 words. Search for word count totals in books word counters. The hunger games has 27 untitled chapters, and about 3700 words per chapter. 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. Word count varied from 5,000 words to 40,000 words, with an average mean of 17,200 and a median word count of 8,500. The second answer, because its way too long the word count equivalent of two novels, not one and books that are too long are hard to sell in a 140character world. For the book hatchet, the actual word count is 41,672 and i give you 41,212.

There are no hardandfast rules when it comes to what word count a novel in a particular genre should be. The best thing that you can do is look over comparable books and try to judge word count by their size, average words page, and illustration content. Aug 09, 2019 a dance with dragons, the fifth book in george r. The use of words is very simple, there are illustrations on every page and the print is very large.

Jun 12, 2009 as a nonfiction writer myself, i know this is tough. The average fiction book is about 80,000 to 100,000 words, which is about. The harry potter books are young adult titles, and ya publishers generally look for manuscripts in the 50,000 to 80,000 word range. Collecting comp titles will prove useful to you throughout your novels journeyespecially later, when trying to market your book. Picture book word count, and other rules that are meant to be. I publish my books first on smashwords and then, after they pass vetting for the smashwords premium catalog, i publish them on amazon as well. First of all, find your word count in word by opening your document and looking at the bottom left of your screen. The kjv bible breakdown by books, chapters, verses and word counts click or tap icons to share. If im writing a novel, this gives me 40 chapters and 70,000 words when im done. How to write early readers, easy chapter books, and.