Word Count for Novels

As I try to draft my first novel's manuscript I try to pay close attention to information whatever information I can get on the "right" way to do things in the publishing world.

I found a recent post by Jessica on the BookEnds LLC blog regarding approximate word counts for novels. Basically, when in doubt, aim for 80,000 words.

She broke it down further in the post, by thousands of words;
Mystery: 70-90
Romance: 80 to 100
Fantasy/Scifi: 80 to 125
Young Adult: 50 to 75
Women's Fiction, literary fiction, etc.: 80 to 100 (literary fiction can be 125)

This pretty much fit in with the numbers I'd found previously. My aim (the manuscript I'm drafting now is a present-day science fiction story) is around 100,000 words. I'm currently at 64,000 words and working towards the climax.

The thing is that these are rules of thumb. From what I can tell if you have a good story, one that is compelling and pulls the reader in, you have a chance of getting it sold to an agent and/or publisher, unless you go WAY outside of the limits. If the numbers are off your agent/editor will have you alter the story to fit their needs for publication.

If I remember right this was a problem for J.C. Hutchin's 7th Son trilogy. He wrote a 300,000 word monster and then couldn't sell it to publication houses he pitched to...because it was too long. Way too long. He eventually broke it into a trilogy and podcast it for the masses rather than admit defeat and trash the manuscript, which in the end was a good thing because after a long road he got a publishing contract for book one.

Hope the information here was useful to you!