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Position:Home>Books & Authors> How to publish a novella?Question: How to publish a novella!? OK - short stories are near impossible to publish!? Novellas too!? Then all the fiction market is concentrated on novels!?
Well, what is the word limit that the greater majority of the publishing world is seeking!? The minimum word limit!. Many ThanksWww@QuestionHome@Com Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: Marc, the short story market in indeed shrinking, in print anyway!. How many stories do you personally read in magazines every month!? How many magazines containing fiction do you subscribe to!? For most people, including short story writers, the answer is zero or close to it!. However, there's a growing e-zine market which often pays for fiction, although the payment tends to be rather small!. Novellas are a terribly tough sell!. Same questions as before: How many novellas have you read this month!? How many did you buy!? It's rare for novellas of an unknown author to reach print!. Certain e-book markets will consider them, entirely genre-dependent!. Novels are what sells!. Genre often dictates length!. A first novel in mystery often runs about 60,000 - 65,000 words, while a first fantasy might run 100,000 - 110,000 words!. One way to determine how long your novel should be is to identify 5 novels in your genre, each the author's first!. Get the word count at Amazon, using text stats!. Average them, rounding to the closest 5,000 words!. That's a reasonable goal length!.Www@QuestionHome@Com It really depends on the publisher!. If you look at Writer's Market, the publishers and presses would list the maximum word count!. But for a novella, a short novel, I would say from 10,000 words to 25,000!. To be honest, if you have the patience, then it really isn't extremely difficult to publish short stories!. You have 3 options: Magazines, contests, and anthologies!.Www@QuestionHome@Com You have the same problem I do!. But don't despair!. There are a few magazines that will buy pieces up to 12,000 words!. If it's any longer you might consider self publishing or combine your piece with another!. You could publish a novel with two novellas within it!. It makes it easier then trying to just publish one!. Try looking in the 2008 Writer's Market!. It a book that your local library should have and it has long lists of publishes that might take your piece!.Www@QuestionHome@Com 80-100k is pretty standard, fantasy runs longer, 30-50k is novella-ish!. Short seems good these days though!.Www@QuestionHome@Com |