Contents 1 Book lengths in the literary genre 2 Book lengths in science fiction 3 See also 4 References 5 External links

Novels vary tremendously in length. In practice, the boundary between a novella and a novel may be difficult to determine. Several prominent awards draw the line at 50,000 words or more for a novel.

The length of a novel often varies by genre. While a mystery novel is typically on the shorter side, at 65,000 words, a work of fantasy fiction can often exceed 150,000 words. The guides are somewhat arbitrary, as many critics have pointed out. ^[1] Some have suggested the following guidelines for lengths of fictional texts:

Classification	Typical word count[citation needed]	Locus magazine[2]
Novel	over 50,000	over 40,000
Novella	20,000 to 50,000	17,500-39,999
Novelette	7,500 to 20,000	7,500-17,499
Short story	1,000 to 7,500	1,000-7,499
Flash fiction or vignette	under 1,000	under 1,000

Jane Smiley suggests that length is an important quality of the novel.^[3] She writes, : “Most novels run 300 to 400 pages, or 100,000 to 175,000 words.” ^[4] Lengths may vary by sub-genre. For example, the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America specifies word lengths for each category of its Nebula Awards. Many young adult novels start at a length of about 16000 words.^[5]

Below are listed word counts from Amazon.com. These may distort the actual length of the novel, as they may include a preface, introduction, afterward, and other inadvertent tallies. These notable books show the range of a novel's length:

[edit] Book lengths in the literary genre

The following literary books have notability based on their meriting of one of the following: a National Book Award, a Booker Prize, or their appearance on TIME magazine's list of the 100 greatest novels^[6] and/or a list published by The Guardian.^[7]

Literary Book	Comparative word counts
Animal Farm	~30,000
Heart of Darkness	37,488
Wide Sargasso Sea	43,111
Housekeeping	~61,000
Their Eyes Were Watching God	61,298
Mrs. Dalloway	64,218
The Trial	81,208
Ceremony	87,810
The Plague	90,596
The Joy Luck Club	95,056
Life of Pi	100,885
The Kite Runner	106,895
The Tale of Genji	114,973
Native Son	160,494
The House of the Spirits	173,456
Uncle Tom's Cabin	~180,000
The Famished Road	180,796
Palace Walk	200,025
Moby Dick	~211,000
All the King's Men	~215,000
Sacred Hunger	226,177
Ulysses	262,496
Gone with the Wind	420,787
Infinite Jest	483,500
War and Peace	590,233
A Suitable Boy	593,674

[edit] Book lengths in science fiction

All the of the following books have notability based on meriting a Hugo Award and/or a Nebula Award.

Science Fiction Book	Comparative word counts
Ender's Game	100,798
The Dispossessed	115,782
Dune	185,723

[edit] See also

• List of longest novels

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Orson Scott Card, Uncle Orson's Writing Class - Novel length