Word count for a crime novel?

[Jonnie Comet]

If you expect to have it published by a *major* publisher (or read in classrooms), the shorter the better. A modern novel is considered to be somewhere between 175 and 300 pages; this will be an approximate count of about 60,000 - 100,000 words.

If you model your writing on the true classics of detective fiction (I mean at novel length) you'll come in at twice those. That's because *modern* publishers believe *most* readers have short attention spans and can't read anything too long lest they grow bored. I mean, they may have a point-- consider how long the average person has before the mobile phone goes off, the Facebook page updates, or friends post to Twitter; and you'll see how long *average* readers will devote time to reading uninterrupted.

I was *strongly advised* to cut my own works down to what amounts to half their current lengths. I said foo on them all and had them published anyway. Whilst an adventure story, not a detective story, 'Deirdre, the Wanderer' is 454 pages and about 215,000 words. This is on the scale of 'Pride and Prejudice' and 'Jane Eyre', two books that don't exactly suck. Do it your way, be both conservative and economical with words, edit properly and thoroughly, and then send it out (or publish it through a co-op as I did or by yourself as others have done-- notably Alice Seybold with 'The Lovely Bones'). And have no regrets.

Realistically none of this matters till you have a working draft; so get started!

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