How many words in a story?

[rwsteward]

Hola boys and girls...

first post

and my first question.

I know you need to use enough words to tell the story, but as a guide line, how many words make up a story that's not too long, and just about right? No one wants to read "war and peace" when it comes to just plain 'ol sex.

I am at 3000+ and still a bit to go. Just wondering if that's too long, about right, or way too short.

Again, I know I need enough words to get the story told, but just kinda wondering here as I work on my first piece.

rwsteward

 

[CWatson]

You answered your own question.

how many words make up a story that's not too long, and just about right?

enough words to get the story told.

In a little more detail, though: it depends on the story itself. What happens in it? What kind of evolution is there? How much time do you spend on that evolution? What's your pacing? All these things determine word count.

Let's just take a simple idea for a story. It's about two people who rush into marriage because their parents are trying to prevent them from doing so (a la Montague vs Capulet). The story is about them getting used to the realities of living in a marriage, which isn't at all what they expected and leads to some friction at times. It ends when they decide that, despite unexpected problems, they're going to stay together.

If five authors here told this story, how long would it take them? Some might take 10,000 words. Some might take 50,000. Personally, I took 200,000 (which would be a 700-ish page novel), because that's how long it took me to say everything I wanted to. (And I was rushing the last few chapters; it could've been more like 225K if I'd had more patience.) And some wouldn't write the durn thing at all, because they don't want to write long-winded meditations on boring everyday matter; they wanna write gang-bangs and rape fantasies. (Not that a story about marriage is mutually exclusive to those sorts of things; but some people prefer escapism to realism in their sex stories, is my point.)

So, to summarize. How many words does a story need? I dunno. What story is it, and how are you telling it? That's how many.

 

[snoopercharmbrights]

As CWatson said, and to paraphrase Mozart, a story needs exactly the right number of words in it.

How you discover that is to write your story, polish it until it shines, and then, when you are utterly and completely sick and tired of it, and never want to see it again, then (and only then) it is finished.

 

[JoshuaGlynn]

Totally agree...

If you would like to know the avarage word count for story classifications:

Flash fiction tends to be around 1000 words or less.

A short-short runs from that to about 7500 words.

A novelette runs from up to 17,500 words.

A novella is less then 50,000 words

And a Novel is anything above.

But as said, worry less about fitting your story into a word count limit, and more about writing a complete story.

Happy writing
Joshua

 

[CopyCarver]

Two points that haven't yet been mentioned:

Stories here tend to be a bit longer than those in print magazines or anthologies, largely because there are no cost accountants fuming about printing costs or about the amount of advertising space that will be lost if a story runs longer than expected. That said, however, avoid any detail and any phrase that doesn't pull its weight.

Although e-stories may be longer than paper stories, the paragraphs should be shorter. 'Graphs that sprawl three inches down a screen are unpleasant to read, and they tend to turn off most readers.

 

[rwsteward]

Thanks everyone for the information. All three answers were what I needed to know.

I write technical articles for magazines and have a few books published as well. I normally write about energy conversion and low power communications.

In that area, word count is very important. Magazine are especially picky as they only have so many pages to print each month.

Anyway, This project started out as a dare. Some of us guys were sitting around reading the usual forum stuff and I sprouted out that anyone can write this fluff. So I was called out and the guys want to see something.

I found out I was wrong!

This is much, much harder to do than tell someone how to bias a PN junction correctly. Much harder!

It's really hard to write about something that you've never done.

I don't have a clue how it feels for a women to have a climax.

I know that not every guy is 9 inches long and the size of a beer can. Women don't walk around with 38D boobs with perky upright nipples without a bra on.

And my pet bitch? Why don't any of these women or men ever have any clothes on?

Ah poop! I've digressed a bit.

So, this is my first attempt.

My story is based on some real events, a good helping of fiction and some bullshit.

I've polished this story dozens of times and will give it a few more edits on my own.

Then I guess I'll have to hog tie one of the on-line editors, email him or her the copy and fed-ex a box of red pencils.

I have a few questions about quotes and conversation, but will post that in another group.

thanks for everyone's input again!

rwsteward.

 

[CopyCarver]

This is much, much harder to do than tell someone how to bias a PN junction correctly. Much harder!rwsteward.

True, but it's easer than training a sheepdog to herd stray capacitance

 

[rwsteward]

True!

But a tad easier than herding cats I suspect.

rwsteward