What’s your preferred length for a novel? #amreading via @Annecdotist

What’s your preferred length for a novel? #amreading

30/10/2017

Like people, novels come in different sizes. With the rise in obesity, I don’t know what the average size of a human being might be, but I do know that the average for a novel is around 300 pages or 100,000 words – although it varies between genres, just as the average for a person can vary across countries. As a fairly small person, I’m nevertheless sometimes surprised to encounter a member of the same species who is two or three times the size of me. I suppose we have some kind of “standard” in our heads. Is it the same with novels?

Of course, a novel should be exactly the length it needs to be, no more, no less. But when, to take an example from these outliers I’ve plucked from my bookshelves, The Heart’s Invisible Furies contains almost four times as many pages as Evening Primrose, I start to wonder what’s going on. I could class the latter as a novella, although I don’t think the publisher did and I’m not aware of any similar word for a novel that’s super long.

I picked out these ten novels because I enjoyed them all, but generally I tend to prefer average-sized books. Too short, and it might not stick in my mind, especially if there’s no overnight sleep between reading periods. Too long, and – unless it’s really good – I start fretting about all the other books waiting on my TBR shelf. Even so, I’m not sure this is logical. So what about you? Do you have a preferred length for your fiction fix?

A range of sizes among the eleven books I’ve featured this month on Annecdotal. Click or tap on the image for any reviews you might have missed.

8 Comments

Charli Mills

30/10/2017 06:36:10 pm

It depends, but I'm starting to like shorter reads better than I used to.

Annecdotist

3/11/2017 07:45:19 am

Oh, so you used to prefer mammoth reads?

Sarah Brentyn link

30/10/2017 09:37:13 pm

I'm with you on this: " a novel should be exactly the length it needs to be, no more, no less." I know there are word counts that publishers want/expect but, honestly, I can tell if a book is missing something or if it could have used a diet. :-) I think you know what my preference is. (Short, shorter, shortest.)

Annecdotist

3/11/2017 07:48:16 am

Thanks, Sarah.I’m with you part of the way but I’d prefer someone else to have decided before I pick up the book whether it should have been fattened up or slimmed down before publication.

Sarah Brentyn link

6/11/2017 12:19:18 am

Oh, yes. Definitely.

That's what I meant. As a reader, I can tell if a book is missing something and needed to be longer or if it bogged me down and needed to be edited and shortened. I mean, I do like longer books but not if they're full of fluff just to add to the word count and I do like shorter books but not if they've left something out. I would much prefer someone figure that out BEFORE I have to. ;-)

Annecdotist

7/11/2017 01:45:07 pm

Oops, sorry, we're closer than I thought :-)

Norah Colvin link

31/10/2017 10:04:32 am

I add my vote with Charli's to yours. The novel should be just the right length for it. I've read some very long novels, and some very short novels, and some anywhere in between. I think one of the longest ones may have been The Fortunes of Richard Mahony. But since I read it when I was in high school, it may have just seemed long because it was the longest I'd read to that point. Maybe being three novels in one helped extend the reading time. But I loved it. Funny how it was the first long one I thought of. I could probably add a few of Patrick White's in there too. For short, I'd pick Jonathon Livingston Seagull. For in between there are too many to even contemplate, but your two novels were a pleasing length and, as you say, just as long as they needed to be.

Annecdotist

3/11/2017 07:59:18 am

Thanks for sharing, Norah. I looked up The Fortunes of Richard Mahony (never having heard of it and apparently it’s out of print here at least) – a hefty 831 pages! Takes some perseverance but glad you enjoyed it. I remember ploughing through Middlemarch at school, and also commented likely after a difficult start – assuming that was shorter but just checked the page length, it’s 864. I imagine in these days of supposedly shorter attention spans wouldn’t try to subject teenagers to such long reads, but I do wonder if it could have put some off reading altogether. I imagine that you, like me, were already an avid reader, so fine to try something a bit more challenging at school. But for reluctant readers they must’ve been torture!
Thanks for your kind words about my novels. I think my experience of cutting out all that was not strictly necessary has made me less patient with books that are published with lots of padding.

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