Word count for novels and children's books

Chuck Sambuchino has what he calls the definitive post on word counts for children's books and novels.

The most important thing here is to realize that there are always exceptions to these rules. And man, people love to point out exceptions - and they always will. However, if there is one thing I remember from when my wife dragged me kicking and screaming to He's Just Not That Into You, it's that you cannot count on being the exception; you must count on being the rule. Aiming to be the exception is setting yourself up for disappointment. What writers fail to see is that for every successful exception to the rule (e.g., a first-time 150,000-word novel), there are at least 100 failures if not 300.

Almost always, high word count means that the writer simply did not edit their work down enough. Or - it means they have two or more books combined into one.

Get the word counts.