Max length for submissions?

[Thalisea]

Hi

I am new on this website and I am planning on submitted a story soon but I need to know if there is a max length limit for a submission, because I’m already 3500 words long and even if it’s closing on it’s end, it will probably go over 4000.

I could find a way to cut it in half to make it more digestable, but it was supposed to be only the first chapter (The story will have two or three parts).

So please tell me if there is a cap, even if it’s informal. I could only find info on the min limits.

Thank you

 

[KeithD]

No maximum has been reported, I don't think.

 

[Thalisea]

There's a minimum of 750 words, but so far no maximum has been indicated. 4000 words is not that much for a story; slightly more than one Lit-page.

One Literotica page is less than 2000 words (the one I checked was 1663 words).

Thanks for the info.

 

[oggbashan]

One Literotica page is less than 2000 words (the one I checked was 1663 words).

Thanks for the info.

The normal accepted Lit page length is 3750 words.

A story of six Lit pages (about 22,500 words) isn't long...

 

[SimonDoom]

There's no maximum. Don't worry about it. There are stories here that are full novel length.

 

[NotWise]

One Literotica page is less than 2000 words (the one I checked was 1663 words).

Either that was not a complete page, the words were very long, or the word count was incorrect.

A full Lit page normally comes out to about 3700-3750 words, but the actual length varies. People who've studied the style sheets here think that the page is defined (at least initially) as 20,000 characters. The page length is modified so the break occurs between paragraphs.

The average-length English word is a little over 5 characters, so the page length is typically under 4,000 words; 3750 is a good approximation.

It isn't unusual for people to post large novellas or even novels as a single Lit story. Quite a few of mine are 20,000-40,000 words. The readers seem to award lower scores to short stories, say one Lit page or less.

 

[ElectricBlue]

There's no maximum. Don't worry about it. There are stories here that are full novel length.

This. The longest single submission I've seen was over 250,000 words (70 or so Lit pages). Something by Lien Geller - it's been taken down since and commercialised, I believe.

 

[ElectricBlue]

This is great info. I thought my first story was pretty long at 7,000 words and was surprised it didn't even make it onto page 3.

@OP the attention span here is longer than you might think. It's better to go a little bit too long than too short. If a reader gets tired of waiting around they can always skip to the juicy bits anyway!

Or skip the juicy bits and read the story. That also happens .

 

[Thalisea]

Either that was not a complete page, the words were very long, or the word count was incorrect.

A full Lit page normally comes out to about 3700-3750 words, but the actual length varies. People who've studied the style sheets here think that the page is defined (at least initially) as 20,000 characters. The page length is modified so the break occurs between paragraphs.

The average-length English word is a little over 5 characters, so the page length is typically under 4,000 words; 3750 is a good approximation.

It isn't unusual for people to post large novellas or even novels as a single Lit story. Quite a few of mine are 20,000-40,000 words. The readers seem to award lower scores to short stories, say one Lit page or less.

Ah yes sorry, the story was only one page, which is why it stopped at 1663, I should have looked at a multi-page story...

It’s great info, thank you. It felt long on my doc sheet, but if it’s barely one page, I don’t have anything to worry about.

But since it will be my first story here and I don’t have a following, I prefer sticking to short stories for now, since people would hardly read a very long story from someone they don’t know I believe.

 

[NotWise]

Ah yes sorry, the story was only one page, which is why it stopped at 1663, I should have looked at a multi-page story...

It’s great info, thank you. It felt long on my doc sheet, but if it’s barely one page, I don’t have anything to worry about.

But since it will be my first story here and I don’t have a following, I prefer sticking to short stories for now, since people would hardly read a very long story from someone they don’t know I believe.

I made my first stories here intentionally short. Keeping the stories short was something I challenged myself to do because I had a history of short stories turning into long stories.

One clarification, though. The average length of an English word varies from source to source, but seems to be around 4.5-4.7 characters, but when you convert from a document length in characters to a length in words, the spaces and punctuation get folded into the word length. Hence 5.5-5.7 characters/word including spaces and punctuation. I seem to use short words, and mine tend to average ~5.2 characters/word.

 

[ElectricBlue]

But since it will be my first story here and I don’t have a following, I prefer sticking to short stories for now, since people would hardly read a very long story from someone they don’t know I believe.

Good plan. If you've just started writing there's no way you're ready to write the next great American novel. If you're a novice writer, you won't even know what your preferred style is until you've got a dozen or so short pieces under your belt. And here on Lit, a short piece is 5k - 10k words. Do your apprenticeship, nail your technical chops and hone your technique. Only then will you be ready to tackle your first "big story." That's when it gets easier, I reckon.

 

[Thalisea]

I would disagree actually. I read long stories from people I've never read before all the time. My sole criteria for reading a story is 1) is it a title/short description/category I'm interested in and 2) is the writing good? I'm speaking more from my experience as a long-time reader and lurker than as an author, since I just started writing here.

No one knows how long your story is until they click it, and if they click it they're going to read at least the first few paragraphs, unless your opening sentence really turns them off. If the beginning is good, they'll keep reading. If the rest is good, they'll want more of it, not less.

While I'm sure it's true that people who already follow you are more likely to read your stories, you have to get them to follow you first!

Bottom line IMO is write the best story you want to write. If you think the story is better because it's shorter, then keep it shorter, but don't do it because you think that will appeal more. I'm not recommending you write a 10+ Lit page story, but don't feel like you need to be on 1-2 pages.

That’s an interesting point. I wasn’t planning on making my stories unnecessarily longer or shorter anyway, I just hope that the length will fit the content and what I’m trying to write. But somehow, I’d rather write episodicly, that way I can get feedbacks between chapters and improve the story as it is published. And maybe later I’ll be ready to write a full length story and publish it at once.

 

[LexxRuthless]

That’s an interesting point. I wasn’t planning on making my stories unnecessarily longer or shorter anyway, I just hope that the length will fit the content and what I’m trying to write. But somehow, I’d rather write episodicly, that way I can get feedbacks between chapters and improve the story as it is published. And maybe later I’ll be ready to write a full length story and publish it at once.

That was what I thought when I first started. Unfortunately, it completely derailed my first series. I did not realize that the handful of vocal commenters did not really represent most of my readers, and catering to those folks led the story down dark paths where most readers did not want to follow. It stopped being fun for me to write long before I stopped working at it. If you want to write your story in episodes, that is fine. Just make sure you have a clear vision where you want your story to go and stick to your vision.

Nobody else knows your story or your characters better than you do.

 

[Thalisea]

That was what I thought when I first started. Unfortunately, it completely derailed my first series. I did not realize that the handful of vocal commenters did not really represent most of my readers, and catering to those folks led the story down dark paths where most readers did not want to follow. It stopped being fun for me to write long before I stopped working at it. If you want to write your story in episodes, that is fine. Just make sure you have a clear vision where you want your story to go and stick to your vision.

Nobody else knows your story or your characters better than you do.

Thank you. I’ll keep that in mind

 

[Handley_Page]

Hi

I am new on this website and I am planning on submitted a story soon but I need to know if there is a max length limit for a submission, because I’m already 3500 words long and even if it’s closing on it’s end, it will probably go over 4000.

I could find a way to cut it in half to make it more digestable, but it was supposed to be only the first chapter (The story will have two or three parts).

So please tell me if there is a cap, even if it’s informal. I could only find info on the min limits.

Thank you

If your story is reckoned to be about 4000 in each of three parts, may I suggest that you write the lot, put it together and submit one story of 8-12 thousand words?
Put some meat in the sandwich !

 

[Thalisea]

If your story is reckoned to be about 4000 in each of three parts, may I suggest that you write the lot, put it together and submit one story of 8-12 thousand words?
Put some meat in the sandwich !

I’ll think about it. Thanks

 

[ElectricBlue]

If your story is reckoned to be about 4000 in each of three parts, may I suggest that you write the lot, put it together and submit one story of 8-12 thousand words?
Put some meat in the sandwich !

I agree with that suggestion. A 10k - 12k story or chapter length seems to be a happy medium, an "ideal" length.

I'm running a writer's experiment at the moment, which started as flash fiction with subsequent chapters getting longer. The score pattern very clearly shows a preference for longer, complete chapters rather than shorter cliff-hangers with no idea of the next chapter's release. I'm doing it as an experiment to gauge reaction, but it's not an approach I'd recommend, certainly not to a beginner.

 

[Thalisea]

I agree with that suggestion. A 10k - 12k story or chapter length seems to be a happy medium, an "ideal" length.

I'm running a writer's experiment at the moment, which started as flash fiction with subsequent chapters getting longer. The score pattern very clearly shows a preference for longer, complete chapters rather than shorter cliff-hangers with no idea of the next chapter's release. I'm doing it as an experiment to gauge reaction, but it's not an approach I'd recommend, certainly not to a beginner.

It’s interesting. I hadn’t thought about the fact the for the reader, it’s unclear when the next episode would be released, and so they’d preferably not want to spend their time on it. You made a very fine point.

 

[NotWise]

It’s interesting. I hadn’t thought about the fact the for the reader, it’s unclear when the next episode would be released, and so they’d preferably not want to spend their time on it. You made a very fine point.

If you are going to put a story out in chapters, then the best way to do it for yourself and for your readers is to write all of the chapters before any are posted, and then publish them on a regular basis.

 

[Thalisea]

If you are going to put a story out in chapters, then the best way to do it for yourself and for your readers is to write all of the chapters before any are posted, and then publish them on a regular basis.

What about publishing them at the same time, but separated, so people can see the structure right away in the repertory? Or is it just better to publish in the same text body?

 

[ElectricBlue]

If you are going to put a story out in chapters, then the best way to do it for yourself and for your readers is to write all of the chapters before any are posted, and then publish them on a regular basis.

Yes. My little experiment confirms that - as I thought it would.

If you're going to release chapters, it's usually best to have it all written, make sure each chapter is self-contained (think about what makes a chapter), and get its release scheduled every day or two (depending on category and overall length).

There are notable (and noteworthy) exceptions to this guidance, but on the whole, they're rare.

 

[Thalisea]

Yes. My little experiment confirms that - as I thought it would.

If you're going to release chapters, it's usually best to have it all written, make sure each chapter is self-contained (think about what makes a chapter), and get its release scheduled every day or two (depending on category and overall length).

There are notable (and noteworthy) exceptions to this guidance, but on the whole, they're rare.

Did you discribe you experiment in more detail in a thread, and what the results are exactly? I would be interested in reading it if you did.

 

[Bramblethorn]

What about publishing them at the same time, but separated, so people can see the structure right away in the repertory? Or is it just better to publish in the same text body?

We've talked over this a few times on this board without coming to a definitive conclusion one way or another. My suspicion is that it doesn't make much difference. Either way, probably about half the people who start reading will drop out before the end, but if you break it up in chapters that dropping-out will be more visible in the story stats.

 

[NotWise]

What about publishing them at the same time, but separated, so people can see the structure right away in the repertory? Or is it just better to publish in the same text body?

If you publish them at the same time, then they'll probably all drop off their category's hub and out of view within one or two days of each other. If you spread them out then you can keep your chapters continuously in view for an extended period. Depending on how many chapters there are, that could be weeks or months.

I have several stories that are broken internally into chapters. I do that so the readers don't have to read the story in one sitting, or hunt for their stopping point every time they want to start reading again. The disadvantage again, is that the whole story will drop out of view at the same time, whereas if you publish at regular intervals your story is in view for a potentially long time.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Did you discribe you experiment in more detail in a thread, and what the results are exactly? I would be interested in reading it if you did.

It started out as a 750 Word Anthology story, where the object of the exercise was to write exactly 750 words. Because it was so short, it then became a quick and simple add-on to write slightly longer chapters, culminating in a much longer "typical" chapter length final chapter. I wanted to see how many readers would follow a story with short chapters (most "got" what I was doing). It was no surprise that the score count for the early chapters was low, then the final chapter was a far higher score with double the View count. I put the latter down to the extra pull of a Red H, and folk reading that chapter twice (it's only 4k words, which for me is short). The whole thing is only 9k, over six chapters.

The first two sequential parts are listed here - the story sequence follower got cocked up with a second "series", which is now in the wrong order. I've only just noticed that - which is a bit of a bugger.

https://www.literotica.com/beta/s/a-girl-on-the-bus
https://www.literotica.com/beta/s/a-girl-on-the-bus-pt-02

then up to Part 6 - which is the end of the first story cycle.