We’re talking loooooong books today…like 700-800 pages long. And not just for a fantasy book, but for all sorts of romance subgenres, even those that are usually around 300-400 pages for a full-length. So what’s the deal with the sudden upswing lately in big books?
A lot of this is due to KU. If you’re an author being paid by pages read, an 800-page book is going to mean more money for you.
But that’s IF you can keep the reader hooked for 800 pages and reading all the way through rather than DNFing somewhere along the way. And that’s if you can even get them to pick up your book in the first place after they realize how long it is (some readers will nope out on books that they can’t read in an evening or that require a lengthy time commitment).
Let’s talk genre expectations too. There are vague standard lengths for certain romance subgenres—I’d say that contemporaries can range from 40K to 100K words, historical can go a little higher than that (~120K), paranormal can go about the same, and fantasy can go way higher. (The more complex the world building, the more potential for word count to skyrocket. This is not to say that contemporary doesn’t do world building—it absolutely does—but it’s much simpler to grasp than historical/social contexts or magical systems.) And of course, all of these “standard lengths” can go out the window when it comes to self-publishing when you aren’t constrained by publishers’ limits.
But does a contemporary really need to be 800 pages (around 200K words)? What is necessary to tell a story in 200K words that you couldn’t do in much fewer words than that?
What often happens in these long books (of any subgenre) is they meander into tangents. Scenes don’t really advance the plot. The main conflict is ignored for a good chunk of the story. The pacing and momentum are off because of all the stopping-starting of plot points. The whole book—especially the middle—feels bloated and overindulgent. And that’s when you’re going to lose readers because they'll get bored waiting for the story to pick up again. And if that happens, they might not come back to you for the next book or dive into your backlist, and you ultimately lose out on potential future sales (and potential fans) that way.
As an editor, I get absolutely ruthless with scenes that don’t push the plot and/or the characterization forward—I cut those without remorse. To me, a tightly written book is going to keep the reader engaged and excited to keep turning pages, and is more likely to get you good read-through to the end of the book (thereby getting you more money).
But readers seem to be really digging these long books lately, so what gives? Lots of newer readers of romance might be coming in through Wattpad or fanfic, where it’s super common to write long, because no editors are checking those author, and they're often writing and posting chapters that are helping the author understand where they're going next, rather than having it all pre-written ahead of time. (By no means is every fanfic writer posting a WIP—there are lots who write the whole story, self-edit it and/or have it beta’d, then post each chapter.) So these readers have been conditioned to enjoy long stories because of emotional involvement in the story that might be serially posted over weeks to months to years.
(I’m a long-time fanfic reader, and I have definitely read my fair share of 800K+(!) fanfics. But it’s daunting to jump into those and invest my time in them, especially when they’re WIPs—iykyk—because it’s a commitment. I need to hear a lot of hype and/or recommendations from people whose taste I trust before I dive in.)
Another reason why readers are diving into these long books is {gestures to world}. Who doesn’t want to escape reality for a while? Like, a long while?
And to be honest, some of my all-time favourite books, the ones that I go back to over and over again, are super long, but I just love rolling around in those worlds and getting lost in them. The thing those books all have in common is that the authors have great voices that suck me in and get me invested (even when I know exactly what’s going to happen because I’ve read it a million times). Voice trumps everything for me.
So is writing these long books a sustainable practice? I’m obviously biased as someone whose whole job is to critique books—I think most long books are too long and need a good editor to help tighten the story up. But as a reader? If you hone your voice and tell a great story in a unique way and with confidence, I will probably wish for an even longer book from you. But I also look at a super-long book and have to steel myself to read it and find time for it—and that can mean that a reader might continually push your book down the TBR pile and never actually get to it.
All that said, I do not think you should write long for the sake of getting more page reads on KU and increasing your take-home. Readers are savvy and can tell when you’re doing that, and you don’t want to alienate them. Tell a good story well, get an editor who knows their shit, and be ruthless yourself in killing your darlings to take out the extraneous and keep the important bits that make your story your own.
Would love to hear your opinion on this. Do you read long books? Do you like them? What makes you pick them up and keep reading? What makes you put them down? Tell me everything in the comments!