: How long is a single-title romance novel supposed to be? My friend is a literary agent who mostly works with YA novels, but she told me recently that I should aim for about 75,000 words for
My friend is a literary agent who mostly works with YA novels, but she told me recently that I should aim for about 75,000 words for my book, which I'm currently speccing out as a romance novel or maybe chick-lit, depending on how the genre-bending shakes out. (Her numbers are 250 words per page, and about 250 pages.)
However, going by the books I've enjoyed most, single-title romances tend to be 350 words per page and 350-375 pages. This comes out to over 100,000 words per book!
I know category romances (Harlequins, Mills & Boon books) are much shorter -- usually about 150 pages and about 50,000 words long -- but are single-title books really that short? To put it another way: what's the accepted wordcount range for a single-title romance novel?
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Your novel should be as long as it needs to be. Not shorter, not longer. Too vague? Well, that's writing ;)
Honestly I think we already answered this question, but I can't find it. To summarize out of my head:
A novel starts around 50,000 words. That's a widely accepted figure no matter what genre you write in.
Write, don't care about word limits. If you think all the time "Oh, I have to add something here, do that to reach [enter arbitrary word limit here]" then you only will achieve one thing: messing up your story
Check the market. If you really want to know what's the general word length of a romance novel, look at what's published. Do not stop at the books you enjoyed. Assuming that word count has anything to do with it, is a sure road to a writing disaster.
If a literary agent tells you to aim for 75,000 words, it is very likely that she told you a mean value (surprise: 75,000 is in the middle between 50,000 and 100,000).
So the ultimate answer to your question is:
The accepted word count range for a single-title romance novel is whatever your readers buy.
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