Lars Eighner's Homepage Writers' Workshop FAQ: Q. How long should my manuscript be?

Q. How long should my manuscript be?

A. As long as it has to be and not one word longer.

Magazines and contests usually have guidelines for length in various categories. Get these guidelines and study them. Magazines sometimes do run a piece that is much shorter or longer than their guidelines suggest, but of course as a newcomer, you should stick to the guidelines. Contest guidelines tend to be more like rules; your entry could be disqualified if it is even a word too long.

In Nebula and Hugo rules (or at least at one time, be sure to get current rules for current competitions):

7,500 words -- short story
7,500 -- 17,500 -- novelette
17,500-40,000 -- novella
40,000+ -- novel (though most novels are over 60,000)

This is about right for maximums, but outside of competitions the rules are not so hard and fast. I might add:

1,000 -- 1,500 words -- Short short stories

Lately we have heard much about flash fiction ( 500-750 words or less), but this seems more a category devised by workshop instructors than one much in demand commercially.

In truth, few magazines look for short stories as long as 7,500 words. The practical maximum is more like 5,000 and many publications prefer shorter pieces (like 3,000).

Cheap generic romances and some porn novels are around 40,000 but 60,000-80,000 words is more typical for a first novel in most markets. Beach novels and blockbusters, of course, are very much longer (100,000+ words).

Many critics make distinctions based on structure: short shorts have twisty, crisp endings; novellas have unity of time, place, and person, and so forth. In such schemes, "novella" is generally considered synonymous with "novelette" and is distinguished from long short stories, although the lengths may be similar.