Outlandish - is it bad?

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LJackson

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Thank you, eqb. I have started a new wave of editing, this time focusing on cutting down unnecessary words. The prior editing had always focused on the flow of the story, and the placements of the scenes, not the strength of it. So far I have managed to cut 10K from part 1, so part 1 is now 110K instead of 120K, and I'm only half way through it. Turn out to be quite a fantastic exercise. I need to be careful not to get too happy with cutting, and ending up dis-improving it though. The beginning is still problematic, and may not come out for another weeks or months, yike. We will see how it turns out.
 
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Brutal Mustang

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I need to be careful not to get too happy with cutting, and ending up dis-improving it though.

I wouldn't worry about this. The fewer words you use to say something, the more powerful it becomes.

In general, agents and readers will be more forgiving of a long manuscript if your writing is tidy, to-the-point, and easy to read. If it reads 'bloaty', confusing, and doesn't have a rhythm/flow to it, people will be like, "500 more pages of this? Hell no."
 

Ellis Clover

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The ones who say I love it, but don't ask for the remainder are just being polite. The ones who ask the remainders are probably liking it. The one who starts but never finish part 1 - well, you know they hate it.

I agree with you. I know that, for me, I don't care who you are or how much I love you - I'm not reading 460,000 damn words to be polite, I'm reading them because they're 460,000 words of compelling story.

I (the general 'I') might not be a great judge of what makes a saleable story, though. A few more pairs of eyes can only be useful.

(PS, congratulations on finishing such an impressive project!)
 

LJackson

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Thank you, HerNameIsLizzy. It only took me twenty years to acknowledge the idea, and another five to put it on paper. I sure hope if I get crazy enough and decide to tread over from the armchair of a reader to the stiff desk of a writer ever again, it wouldn't take this long. Or I will have to read it from my grave, lol.

On a more serious note, if books greater than 100K are not saleable, the collection of books I have between my husband and I must be plucked from the other world. I cannot even count in two hands in our collection that aren't over 120K, and 180K is "normal" in our eyes. We are not the rare breed, by the way. I have several favorites that are so large that they are divided into four or five (continuous) parts, with each part estimated to be about 180K ~ 200K. These are not the wisest to get into, unless you are ready to read 24 hours nonstop, like I did:).
 
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cornflake

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Thank you, HerNameIsLizzy. It only took me twenty years to acknowledge the idea, and another five to put it on paper. I sure hope if I get crazy enough and decide to tread over from the armchair of a reader to the stiff desk of a writer ever again, it wouldn't take this long. Or I will have to read it from my grave, lol.

On a more serious note, if books greater than 100K are not saleable, the collection of books I have between my husband and I must be plucked from the other world. I cannot even count in two hands in our collection that aren't over 120K, and 180K is "normal" in our eyes. We are not the rare breed, by the way. I have several favorites that are so large that they are divided into four or five (continuous) parts, with each part estimated to be about 180K ~ 200K. These are not the wisest to get into, unless you are ready to read 24 hours nonstop, like I did:).

First, note that it's hard to estimate wc from print.

Second, most huge whacks of novels are from well-established authors.

The Stand is massive (and shouldn't be, imo); some of the later Harry Potter are massive (and shouldn't be, according to JKR), and yes, there are some epic fantasy that are large, and Infinite Jest, and etc.

For the 99.999% of authors (and in here I'm including most published authors), yeah, 400k words, or anything even close, is flat unsellable. It will not even be considered by an agent or house. The financial risk is too large.

For the .001% who can either do whatever the hell they please and have agents and houses at their beck and call (see above JKR, King, etc.), or the lottery-level rare person who finds an agent and a house who just falls in love with something 200k+,well, if you were King, you wouldn't be asking, and if you're not, stuff happens, but I'd no more bet on that than I'd bet on winning the actual lottery.

No one here is saying this stuff to discourage you, or to suggest that people you trust were blowing smoke.

We've all seen people with unrealistic ideas; we try to be realistic. No one has suggested your work itself is unpublishable - just that it's seriously not likely to be so in the trade market, in what was its 460k-word form.

Doesn't mean it can't be edited or split, or that it's not tightly written, but we can only go by our experience and make suggestions based on what we perceive to be the best ideas to help you reach your goals.
 
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LJackson

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Please back off the word count debate, or whether I should trust people I choose to trust.

The book will have the word count it needs to be, regardless the size.

The people I trust will be those I should trust, regardless their relations to me.

If you truly want to help me succeed, which I sincerely believe you do, please help me to get my book (or books) better, so it is an outstanding piece of work, that even the toughest critters like you can be proud of.

I do not object trimming down - almost all firsts drafts are overwritten, and I'm sure mine is no exception. I'm not objecting to separating them into more manageable pieces - I prefer it actually. However, the final size of the book will be the size it should be. I cannot dictate it in advance, and to hound on something I cannot dictate is not helping me. The only thing that I can control is the quality of the book.

You can help me troubleshoot, or brainstorm. You can help me identify problematic areas in the writing, so at least I can evaluate something I likely never thought of. My two foray into SYW have generated a lot of positive inputs. I will not adopt all of them, but even the ones I choose not to use, ultimately provided me an important view to know what issues might arise, and how I might improve based on the critiques.

I understand these take serious efforts on your part, but please know that, I sincerely appreciate them.

Thank you.
 
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eqb

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On a more serious note, if books greater than 100K are not saleable, the collection of books I have between my husband and I must be plucked from the other world.

Of course, publishers buy books that are longer than 100K. Very few of those are by first-time authors.

And of course, there are exceptions to the debut author/100k guideline. If you have an outstanding book that looks as though it will sell and sell well, in spite of your being an unknown, a publisher will buy it.

If your book needs to be 460K, but you can't get a publisher or agent, your other choice is to write a different, shorter book (again, as long as it needs to be), and save this epic for later in your career.

Or you can self-publish.
 

greendragon

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I love long books as well. My favorites are Diana Gabaldon's Outlander books. Easily 500K or more each! Don't be afraid to have a super-novel. Maybe the publisher will want to cut it up - but if you really want it to be one book, go self publishing.
 

Olika

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I love long books as well. My favorites are Diana Gabaldon's Outlander books. Easily 500K or more each! Don't be afraid to have a super-novel. Maybe the publisher will want to cut it up - but if you really want it to be one book, go self publishing.

According to Gabaldon, the word counts for (most of) the Outlander books are as follows:
OH, let’s see…

OUTLANDER – 305,000

DRAGONFLY IN AMBER – 350,000

VOYAGER – 385,000

DRUMS OF AUTUMN – 425,000

THE FIERY CROSS – 508,000 [cough]

A BREATH OF SNOW AND ASHES – 500,000

And I don’t think I ever did a formal word-count for ECHO; it’s around the same size as VOYAGER, though.

–Diana

So not exactly easily 500k. ;) Only two of seven make it that far, and most of them are a good 100k below it. But as you have illustrated, these are books that readers consider very long (so much so that I would guess that you wouldn't be the only one to overestimate their length). Edit: upon rereading this post, it also seems telling to me that Gabaldon herself seems to think her lone 500k+ entry on this list is quite long, given the little [cough] up there!

That said, I believe Outlander was Gabaldon's first novel. I don't know the story behind its publication or whether it took her a very long time to sell, but it is significantly longer than most debut novels. 300k is a lot. So it is possible...but I have to say I'm with cornflake in that I think it very uncommon, and if I were trying to sell a debut novel of that length I would probably consider pitching it as a series instead right out of the gate.

But! LJackson, I know you want people to back off on the word count thing, so I'll just say best of luck to you! :) You're right that the book will be however long it needs to be, since it's your book and you're the only one who can really make that call. So...do what you've got to do, I guess!
 
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JHFC

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500,000 words is almost the length of War and Peace. Speaking of War and Peace, I also have a fair number of very long books I enjoy-- but as I look at them on my shelves, none of them were published in the last 80 years, with the exception of some fantasy (by established authors.)
 
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