This is a list of the novels over 500,000 words published through a mainstream publisher. See my later post for a detailed explanation and instructions on how to calculate book length. Estimate your page count book designer linda parke. Specifically, an accessible nonfiction book might be anything between about 30,000 words and 50,000 words. Your chapter structure needs to be in proportion to the overall length of the book. Estimate your page count fiona raven book designer. Word count is a direct way to measure the length of a novel in a manner. Easygoing, fairly light, userfriendly, nonfiction book for the masses. If yes, then most publishers still work on specific word count lengths for books so youll probably be aiming for around 60,00080,000 words for nonfiction. Under length books are often regarded with suspicion by scholars. Nonfiction books also vary tremendously in word count. The harry potter books are young adult titles, and ya publishers generally look for manuscripts in the 50,000 to 80,000 word range. Coyne uses the nanowrimo wordcount length of 50,000 words for his. Book size is often based on how thick the spine will be and how it will stand out in a bookstore although things are changing.
Nonfiction meaning in the cambridge english dictionary. If youd like some guidelines, you can assume that the average nonfiction book is 50k words, and that they have 12 chapters, so around 4k words would be an average chapter length. The trim size of your book dictates approximately how many words fit on. Ive started this list to make it easier for people to find x titles if theyre doing the az challenge. In my opinion, if your nonfiction book is fewer than about 30,000 words 120 pages, it does not feel substantial enough to be real book. Nonfiction novel definition of nonfiction novel by. New word count guidelines for contemporary fiction and nonfiction. Synonyms for book at with free online thesaurus, antonyms, and definitions. I have 42 years of experience writing magazine nonfiction for adult. So, do this for some books in your field, find one that matches the same depth and detail that you want to attain for your book, and give yourself an estimate based on that. A book s total score is based on multiple factors, including the number of people who have voted for it and how highly those voters ranked the book. As you can see, a smaller trim size will produce more pages for the same word count, and a larger trim.
And, keeping your chapters short creates a good balance between content and action, and fits with this model of short actionable content. Calculate book page count using word count for book design. I just popped into my office and pulled a few books off the shelf. A word count guide for 18 book genres, including fiction and non. Books falling outside the standard range of 272320 pages can be problematic. Another rule of thumb is you can get 250 to 300 words on a typeset page. At the other end of the spectrum a book of 80,000 to 100,000 words has significant heft, 320400 pages. Generally i consider any novel that is less than 300 pages to be a short one, 500 page a medium sized novel and anything more than 750 a lengthy novel.
Please do not add x men or x files, those are all too easy to find. Your guide to book word counts fiction and nonfiction. If youre trying to figure out how many pages your book will end up being, a page in a six by nine book which is a pretty standard size for a nonfiction book is about 250 words equals one page. That number actually lines up pretty well with the data we have on this, but again, that number should neither be a goal, nor a constraint. See more ideas about people, famous faces and 40th president. There are a few book word count guidelines for each genre, but these arent hard. Synonyms for nonfiction include factbased, factual, reference, truelife, realistic, authentic, true, historical, real and biographical.