Erotic Novel

[GoldenCojones]

So I have this cute little erotic story I've been telling myself for well over a decade. Whenever I'm trying desperately to avoid doing something worthwhile I write on it. I never really intended for it to be anything more than that, but while avoiding writing my Holiday story today I was dabbling in it and I noticed that Word shows the word count at just over 300,000 words.

So if I chose to submit this or do something with it, what would I do? It would be fifty or so chapters, maybe more, if I chose to split it up. It wouldn't really work as a Novella, would it?

And it really isn't done. I never really planned an ending for it and I don't know that I want to end it now.

 

[NaokoSmith]

Edit it down severely until you can get it into the Six Word Story thread

LOL, no, you can submit it as a Novel in separate chapters. People think Novels and Novellas has low readership, but it's going to take some staying power to get through yours in any case. I got really good feedback in Novels and Novellas for my novel.


If you worry about the low readership, you could write a little prequel story which you could put into the category of your choice to whet people's appetite, then tell them the chapters of a whole novel on the topic will be posting soon.

You can also post chapters of novels in a particular category, if it definitely belongs in one of them, or even across categories.

 

[GoldenCojones]

Thanks NaokoSmith

Hmm, well it could all go in LW, but I personally hate most chapter stories I see. I can't even tell you why. And I've never seen one with 50+ chapters either.

I guess I thought there was a limit, even in Novellas. I'm not worried about low readership although if no one is going to read it, why post it. And would the system handle a 300,000 word story?

And then I'm not even sure I want to post this. That would mean having to go back and edit it A daunting task all in its own. Still I'm curious about my options.

 

[NaokoSmith]

What are you like! LOL. You get somebody else to edit it.


(Not me, LOL. You know I will only make über feminist suggestions which would ruin the whole thing )

 

[Boxerwing]

This is probably not quite the answer you're looking for, but I'm going to say it anyway. The world needs to read your story. Whatever or however long it is.

I cannot imagine that Lit has a word limit; I mean I've seen some stories divided up into chapters that are 50+ chapters. You'd still have to divide it up, and yes, that would be a pain. And honestly, as much as I hear readers want some sort of finale, I've read "unfinished" stories that I'm glad I read.

I don't envy your editing requirements, though. Can you get help from a long-term editor, one that is aware of your situation? There will probably be someone out there that can help.

 

[RejectReality]

https://www.literotica.com/s/threads-the-island?page=42

https://www.literotica.com/s/the-preacher-man?page=46

The system can handle a lot. That's somewhere around 150k words in a single submission. Weird Harold knows the absolute limits, I believe.

If it doesn't have an ending and you're not sure it ever will, that's a bit of a can of worms. If you're absolutely not worried about readership, then I'd mention that right at the beginning. That way nobody ends up feeling ripped off by reading so much only for the story to have no closure.

 

[GoldenCojones]

What are you like! LOL. You get somebody else to edit it.


(Not me, LOL. You know I will only make über feminist suggestions which would ruin the whole thing )

Yes, I'm sure you would be quite bemused by a lot of the stuff in the beginning, and trust me when I say that like everything I write the sex is not safe

It's actually interesting going back and seeing how not only the characters evolve, but the writing has as well. Although the entire thing is about the adventures of a very free-spirited, powerful, self-assured woman. She starts out demure and grows from there. For a while she became a true dominatrix and quite savage but for the last 100 pages or so she has again mellowed. She began to mellow when she got a cute little live in pet. Olivia has had an interesting influence on her.

I don't think I would ever ask a volunteer editor to try and tackle this beast. That would be unfair. Although maybe a beta reader would be okay.

 

[GoldenCojones]

If it doesn't have an ending and you're not sure it ever will, that's a bit of a can of worms. If you're absolutely not worried about readership, then I'd mention that right at the beginning. That way nobody ends up feeling ripped off by reading so much only for the story to have no closure.

That's a great point and if I decide to post it I will certainly put a disclaimer at the top that it may never end. Maybe I will go back and start splitting it up and post it as I finish editing each chapter.

Thanks to everyone who chimed in. I really appreciate all the responses.

 

[TxRad]

That's a great point and if I decide to post it I will certainly put a disclaimer at the top that it may never end. Maybe I will go back and start splitting it up and post it as I finish editing each chapter.

Thanks to everyone who chimed in. I really appreciate all the responses.

Do several rough edits on your own and then wait a little while and do one finial one. In your disclaimer on the ending put a statement on the self editing and if you ever decide to publish it for sale, you'll get a decent editor.

I did this with my 20 chapter story i wrote many years ago but i didn't put in a note about editing. The grammar and spelling police all had heart attacks. Glad to be of service.

All but three chapters ended up with an H and I put it all in group. There wasn't a sex scene that didn't involve at least three people.

One day i need to count the words in that story. 237 Word pages. Somewhere around 40 Lit pages. Approximately 3700 words per Lit page, Uh, 148,000 words.

 

[oggbashan]

300,000 words?

You don't need to break it up as a submission. The category is Novels and Novellas. A standard published paperback novel is 250,000 to 350,000 words.

You would have to have chapter breaks in the text but you don't have to post them separately.

 

[RejectReality]

Provided the system can handle it. I know Weird Harold has posted about an upper limit before.

I know it was high, but don't remember the exact number.

300,000 words?

You don't need to break it up as a submission. The category is Novels and Novellas. A standard published paperback novel is 250,000 to 350,000 words.

You would have to have chapter breaks in the text but you don't have to post them separately.

 

[NaokoSmith]

It's actually interesting going back and seeing how not only the characters evolve, but the writing has as well. Although the entire thing is about the adventures of a very free-spirited, powerful, self-assured woman. She starts out demure and grows from there. For a while she became a true dominatrix and quite savage but for the last 100 pages or so she has again mellowed. She began to mellow when she got a cute little live in pet. Olivia has had an interesting influence on her.

Oh dear! it sounds quite interesting .... But I have a lot of beta-reading/editing on the go at the moment.

Remember that editors actually love to edit. We enjoy it. So you may be doing someone a favour by letting them beta read for you. There may be someone haunting Editors' Forum desperate for 300,000K words to get them through the holiday season!

"Oh Mum, Dad, sorry. I would love to play Monopoly and make sure I lose to my little nephew again. But I promised I would check this out for someone, can't let them down. Thank you, a glass of brandy and a mince pie to help it along would be just great."

 

[RejectReality]

Found it, and I was wrong LOL

As for a maximum, there is none; I successfully submitted four million words via C&P to the original version of the submission form in Beta Testing. If you submit a text or word document via e-mail, the only limit is what your word/text processor can handle.

 

[sr71plt]

It wouldn't really work as a Novella, would it?
:

A novella? No. Like four novels. (an e-book novella can start around 15,000 words and an e-book novel at 45,000 words. In print, a novel can be anywhere from 72,000 words up, but it starts getting unwieldy to print--and not cost-effective to market--at about 150,000 words).

No, a standard paperback novel is NOT 250,000 to 300,000 words. I don't know of any publishers who would actually try to publish that between two covers (and certainly wouldn't market it that way--they'd split it for multiple unit profit and higher volume sales).

I don't think advice off the top to edit it down, though, is good advice. It depends on what's in it. It could all be golden and worth a four-novel series.

 

[JackLuis]

I put up a 40 chapter story. ~200,000 words. It didn't get many views for a long time but about 5000 reads average, lately 21 chapters had red H's up from 16 a few months ago.

It was horridly edited, so I spliced 6-7 chapters into "Saga's and just put them up. a few days ago. Saga 1&2 scored really well, but #3 is lagging,( I think it was one bombed,) but it is climbing up now. I wanted to see if 10K word chapters would score better than 40K word sagas?

Yeah I know what you mean about editing a large work. It took me a long time! I had several editors ignore my pleas for help so I just plugged away. It still has flaws but it's all spelled right now.

 

[GoldenCojones]

A novella? No. Like four novels. (an e-book novella can start around 15,000 words and an e-book novel at 45,000 words. In print, a novel can be anywhere from 72,000 words up, but it starts getting unwieldy to print--and not cost-effective to market--at about 150,000 words).

No, a standard paperback novel is NOT 250,000 to 300,000 words. I don't know of any publishers who would actually try to publish that between two covers (and certainly wouldn't market it that way--they'd split it for multiple unit profit and higher volume sales).

I don't think advice off the top to edit it down, though, is good advice. It depends on what's in it. It could all be golden and worth a four-novel series.

I think the "standard" paperback size changes by genre. Fantasy is huge. Look at the books by Terry Goodkind or Robert Jordan. Erotic fiction is probably a lot smaller though and that is what we are talking about here.

I'm sure editing could trim it down some, but no where close to enough for me to feel good about posting it as a single story. I guess it's time to roll up my sleeves and get to work. Um, wait, I still have to finish that damned holiday story

 

[KeithD]

I think the "standard" paperback size changes by genre. Fantasy is huge. Look at the books by Terry Goodkind or Robert Jordan. Erotic fiction is probably a lot smaller though and that is what we are talking about here.

I'm sure editing could trim it down some, but no where close to enough for me to feel good about posting it as a single story. I guess it's time to roll up my sleeves and get to work. Um, wait, I still have to finish that damned holiday story

A 500,000-word paperback? I don't think so.

 

[sr71plt]

I haven't been in the business for a while, but I've never heard of a bindery that could put that many words between two covers. And, even if one could, a publisher would want to break that many words down into more than one book to be able to have a chance at making a profit off of it--it would be a bear to market without a best-seller author name on it. You can certainly stuff it all in one go here on Lit. if you want, but folks started talking about paper print. It just isn't going to happen in paper for several reasons.

 

[oggbashan]

From Wikipedia:

Longest novel on the list is Tolstoy’s War and Peace (surprise, surprise) at 587,287 words. Note that Ayn Rand’s cult classic Atlas Shrugged isn’t that far behind, at 561,996 words.

Charles Dickens:

1. David Copperfield: 357,489
2. Dombey and Son: 357,484
3. Bleak House: 355,936
4. Little Dorrit: 339,870
5. Martin Chuzzlewit: 338,077
6. Our Mutual Friend: 327,727
7. Nicholas Nickleby: 323,722
8. The Pickwick Papers: 302,190
9. Barnaby Rudge: 255,229
10. The Old Curiosity Shop: 218,538
11. Great Expectations: 186,339
12. Oliver Twist: 158,631
13. A Tale of Two Cities: 137,000
14. Hard Times: 104,821

Several publishers have issued single volume softcovers of War and Peace.

 

[sr71plt]

OK, if you say so. I think the numbers are unbelievable, but you seem to have them. None from American publishing in the last two hundred years, so we must have adjusted down.

The OP can certainly try that with a current publisher if he likes to spin wheels.

 

[oggbashan]

OK, if you say so. I think the numbers are unbelievable, but you seem to have them. None from American publishing in the last two hundred years, so we must have adjusted down.

The OP can certainly try that with a current publisher if he likes to spin wheels.

Unbelievable? I think you are underestimating US authors and publishers:

These were published as one-volume paperbacks in the UK:

Tom Clancy Word Count

Patriot Games – 199,666
Clear and Present Danger – 266,342
The Hunt for Red October – 163,461
The Cardinal of the Kremlin – 200,386
The Sum of all Fears – 330,630
Debt of Honor – 337,885
Executive Orders – 462,282

 

[NotWise]

I think if Golden Cojones were an established author then he might be able to get away with a large book, but not as a first effort. I googled "How long should a first book be" and came up with an article by Chuck Sambuchino at writersdigest.com that was intended to answer the question.

He actually breaks the answer down by category, but for the main category (adult novels: commercial and literary) he gives a range of 71,000 words to 109,000 words. Fantasies can be longer but other categories are shorter. I expect that erotica might be in the "shorter" category.

Given that range, Mr. Cojones' output would be 3-4 normal-sized novels.

 

[sr71plt]

OK, you win Ogg. Not that you're grossly overestimating what someone asking about putting out a first-time erotica novel needs to know. Go ahead and feed the starry eyes.

You're obviously right, as you've shown me, those that a best-selling author can put out a 350,00-500,000-word paperback and a binery can be found to stuff it between two covers. And, of course, then, everyone else can do it too.

 

[oggbashan]

OK, you win Ogg. Not that you're grossly overestimating what someone asking about putting out a first-time erotica novel needs to know. Go ahead and feed the starry eyes.

You're obviously right, as you've shown me, those that a best-selling author can put out a 350,00-500,000-word paperback and a binery can be found to stuff it between two covers. And, of course, then, everyone else can do it too.

I may be right about published books. After all I'm a retired bookdealer.

But you are right about first time erotica. I should apologise for that. And you are right again for any first time novel in the 21st century. Not only will publishers refuse a very long book, but so will readers. Modern readers don't have the stamina that 19th Century readers had, and have many more distractions.

Reading on a screen is different. Apart from needing more paragraph breaks, readers don't want to spend days reading one story.

That won't stop me from writing multi-Lit page stories even if I get little response for the longer ones.

 

[GoldenCojones]

Well this certainly grew into an interesting discussion

To be clear about my status and intent. I've never published an erotic story, much less novel, anywhere but here at Lit and I know most "established" authors don't consider that publishing, but I do.

My intent at the beginning was to never post this "Story" anywhere. I wrote it for my own entertainment and continued to write it when the mood struck me. I just noticed it was frickin' huge and I went back and read some of the beginning of it and thought it actually wasn't as bad as some stuff I've read. That made me think maybe I would submit it. Then I went from there to thinking "How the hell would I do that?"

Thank you to everyone who posted it. It was certainly entertaining and informative.