Book Lengths – Are you getting what you’re paying for?

135 Responses to “Book Lengths – Are you getting what you’re paying for?”

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   Tam Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:13 am

   Fictionwise also reformats books. Suddenly there are 10 pages of stuff in the front when I know the original publisher only had a couple and they put in this thing where you can link back to the table of contents at the end of each chapter which NO publisher I know does. It bugs me. But that’s another story.

   I generally don’t care what you call it, although at Brief Encounters we go by word count. Anything less than 20K we will review as a short story. I don’t care if your publisher calls it a novella, novelette, a sip, a squirt, a kiss, whatever. When we review we put word count and pdf page count (I always use the pdf count from word one of the story to “the end”, not just the total number of pages in the document when you open it – actual pages of story.) No, it doesn’t always mean anything because I’ve checked, and while most publishers have a similar number of words per page, there are few with MASSIVE margins that have much fewer, but it is the best you got and you can can at least compare. Oh, that many words get me “about” X page and that many gets me that many. Is it longer, shorter, the same? Not perfect, but for comparison purposes it can be useful.

   Sometimes it would be nice to know word count, because if you are spending $7 on a novel that can have 180 or 450 pages. Quite a difference when it’s on the cusp of a word count limit. I do get a bit annoyed when I buy one of the novels that is JUST over the line, thus paying significantly more for only a few extra words. But I find that rare and most of the time I can tell by the price how much book I am getting. If it’s $2.99 it’s not going to be a 3 day read. If it’s .99 I can read it at lunch.

   It’s one of those things it’s nice to know, but if it’s 12,400 or 16,500, it doesn’t really matter as long as I know what I’m getting. Page numbers, words, just something for comparison purposes works and even the terms should give you a general idea. You know a sip at TQ is NOT going to be a 2 hour read. Fictionwise also does the “how long this will take you to read” thing which is kind of odd. LOL I’m a fast reader, so I usually cut it down.

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     Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:46 am

     Tam
     As we all know, PDF page counts are useless, and since word count is the only really measurable way to know what you’re getting in terms of book length I don’t understand why all publishers don’t list their word counts. Resellers do but purchasers have to wait until the book is sold through a reseller to know the actual word count unless you know how to figure it out yourself and have the time.

     I just want to know what I’m buying. If a publisher doesn’t list word count and just says that a book is a novel, well that tells me nothing.

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   LVLMLeah Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:26 am

   I did a post on this two years ago. I was noticing that I was paying upwards of $4.99 for a 5K story on some sites, which is outrageous.

   I pay attention to that. If the epub doesn’t post it, then I will got to Fictionwise or All Romance ebooks to check for word count since I know they often do.

   I’m very reluctant to buy a book that I don’t know the WC for since as you so nicely pointed out, everyone has their own meaning of what a short story to Novel is.

   And cutesy words like sips or kisses or got 10 mins? means nothing to me.

   I also know that page counts mean nothing as well. So I don’t even pay attention to that.

   I think LooseId saying they choose not to post it says a lot about how they know that they can charge more money for less words if readers have no clue. I think it’s deceptive myself.

   • 2.1

     

     Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:51 am

     Hi Leah

     Unfortuantely while there is a body that regulates what is a “romance” there is no orgnization that regulates what epublishers can designate as a novel or novella or anything in between. Since we pay based on length of a book I think it’s important that we know what we’re buying, especially since there’s such a wide range in pricing.

     I don’t understand why publishers don’t list word count since they already have this information.

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   Sally Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:26 am

   Thanks so much for this – I actually did a post back in December bemoaning the lack of eBooks and ePublisher standards.

   Some stores/publishers provide you with a page count, others with a file-size, and others with nothing at all. Unless you’re buying a mass-market title, you really don’t know what you’re getting. Sometimes you can use the file-size as a rough guide, but that can so easily be inflated by a high-resolution cover, interior artwork, or just the format of the book itself, that it’s often meaningless.

   I will definitely bookmark this as a guide going forward.

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     Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:53 am

     Hi Sally
     Unfortunately the epublishing industry has no standards as we’re all finding out. Some publishers do post word count and many of them provide value for money however I don’t understand the reluctance on the part of other publishers to provide this infromation. The file size usually means nothing because of the book cover.

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   Teddypig Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:32 am

   Wow! And you posted the email.

   That little quote is still stunning to me.

   “I never price a book based entirely on length. I take author and sub-genre into consideration, as well. Different authors can command different prices for their work, because they are more established, have done the work to build a larger fan base, etc. I believe that’s a fair way to price.”

   Wow just wow!

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     Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:57 am

     Hi TP
     The email was not confidential communication between me and the publisher. She explained what their pricing policies were when I asked if I was overcharged for a book, which BTW is still listed as a novel on the NR website.

     If you’re a new author I think this is good information to know that new authors’ works are going to be discounted.

     If you sent me an email I wouldn’t share the contents because it probably would contain pictures.

     • …

       

       Teddypig Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:12 pm

       Oh no I figured that was their official statement. I know you are always discreet.

       Their statement still scares me.

       • …

         

         Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:36 pm

         Aren’t you lucky you’re not a writer.
         These pesky readers now want to know word count. What’s next. lol

         When are you writing your iPad 2 piece for the site? You have to do it soon because I get mine in 3 weeks (that’s when it’s available in Canada) and I want to know what you think of it before I buy.

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   Leslie Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:41 am

   Thanks for raising this issue, Wave. The number of times I’ve settled down to read what I *think* is going to be a novel-length story and it turns out to be novella-length or even novelette-length! I wish there was more consistency across all publishers, because I do feel that on occasions readers are getting ripped off. I’m surprised that so many publishers consider 30-40k as ‘novel’ territory. Seriously? That’s definitely novella length! IMO novels should be 50k upwards. I like Amber Allure’s way of categorising by word count and wish that other pubs were as transparent.

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     Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 11:15 am

     Hi Leslie

     Thanks for commenting.

     The other problem that I didn’t mention was when I buy a book and about a third of it is full of ads or previews of upcoming books either by the author or publisher. That’s equally annoying but I guess the price doesn’t reflect the added content except the additional material fills up my Kindle real fast.

     A 30 – 35K novel is a bit much because most publishers start at 40 – 45K and others go as high as 55K for a novel, but maybe that’s why some publishers don’t list word count. We definitely need some type of industry standard because this is too confusing, and publishers can pretty well charge purchasers what they want, within reason. Some ebooks are now being sold for $10 – in those cases I opt for print.

     BTW did you know that you won a book on the site? I’ve been waiting to hear from you.

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   K. Z. Snow Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:53 am

   Wow, I guess I’ve written more novels than I realized!

   Great guidelines, Wave. Providing a PDF page count as well as a word count would, I think, help readers determine if they’re getting their money’s worth. Word count alone might not do it, because some people could have difficulty translating that figure into text length.

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     Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 11:19 am

     Hi KZ
     Thanks for dropping by. I know how busy you are.

     PDF page count, as amber Allure pointed out, really doesn’t mean anything although we do include that information in reviews when it’s provided. The problem is those extra wide margins and double line spacing. Converting word count is not that difficult once you’ve done it a couple of times and at least it’s consistent.

     Yes, you have written more novels than you realized at 30K word count.

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     EM Lynley Reply March 4, 2011 at 11:51 am

     KZ, PDF page count is useless and/or misleading. I had a publisher change format on a published novel so a double-spaced PDF was changed into a single-spaced one with no change of font size, effectively making it appear to now be half the length, when the word count was unchanged.

     Also, some pubs use 8.5×11 page size on PDF and others use 6×9 (trade PB size), which drastically alters PDF page counts. It’s so inconsistent, which is one of the reasons I did a poll about it a couple of weeks ago, and Wave joined in the discussion.

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       Buda Reply March 4, 2011 at 7:21 pm

       Wow. I didn’t know any of this. Thanks for the enlightening information. I never once thought about it; just figured PDF was PDF. I read .prc because I have a Kindle, on which PDFs are nearly impossible to read anyway.

       • …

         

         Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:42 pm

         Buda
         You live such a sheltered life. lol. You only look at ‘locations’ on your Kindle, percentage read and what’s left.

         • …

           

           Buda Reply March 5, 2011 at 12:33 am

           That’s mostly true, I admit. And I have been burned before by doing that (which royally pissed me off, I might add). A couple of times I thought I had another 10% or so left, but then BAM! there was the end. The rest was just promo for other books–not necessarily from the same author or on a similar topic to the book I was reading.

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     Alex W Reply March 5, 2011 at 8:33 am

     As Wave pointed out, page counts can be faked (which is rarely a problem in print novels, where formatting is more consistent).

     As for people having difficulty translating…I think if we started using them and people grew familiar with them, it’d be just as easy to get the idea that 50,000 is a novel (or whatever). Once you have the idea that about 50,000 is a novel, the rest of the word counts come pretty easy. It might be awkward at first, but in digital publishing, we need some type of measuring tool.

     (Apologies if this sounds grumpy, it’s not directed at you but to the lack of word counts in general!)

     • …

       

       Wave Reply March 5, 2011 at 11:14 am

       Hi Alex
       Sorry I missed your comment earlier.

       You’re right that the conversions would be easier once we have a number and get accustomed to doing so.

       Since we pay based on word count and whatever the publisher decides is a “novel” or “novella” or whatever, I think that all publishers should give their customers word counts so that they can make informed decisions and do some comparison shopping.

       As you say, in this digital age we need a measuring tool.

       Thanks for commenting Alex.

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   Nova Reply March 4, 2011 at 11:19 am

   That’s exactly what I was thinking!
   If I buy a book I always check the word count, because I don’t want to pay for a novel when in reality it is only a novella or novelette. Page count isn’t really helpful, cause the size or line spacing are always different.
   And I can’t understand the publishers. Why can’t they add the word count to their books? It seems to me that all they want is to squeeze money out of their customers…
   And labeling their books as novel, extended novellas, or similar isn’t helping either.
   So yes, word count is very important to me.

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     EM Lynley Reply March 4, 2011 at 11:47 am

     Julie, You have all the same questions and frustrations as everyone else, and hopefully more publishers will realize what readers are thinking, forcing them to give proper information and charging accordingly.

     That should make readers feel better and in the end will sell more books, so everyone wins.

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     Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 12:57 pm

     Hi Julie

     At least if every publisher listed word count we would have a way of knowing approximately what we’re getting for our money. They already have this information so it’s not something they would have to get from another source, and how much additional work is it to satisfy customer’s concerns?

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   EM Lynley Reply March 4, 2011 at 11:44 am

   I’m so glad to see this post, Wave, after our discussions. I first got interested in this topic a couple of years ago when noticing the huge discrepancies of word count between Fictionwise and ARe.

   The issue of what price to charge concerned me when I first looked at publishers to submit my stories. I had friends pubbed at one place that charged $5.99 or $6.99 for a 30k novella. I knew I wouldn’t sell many at that price, so I kept looking.

   So, as both an author and a reader I feel this is an important topic. I posted about this a couple of weeks ago on LiveJournal and found everyone who answered my poll wanted to know word counts.

   Perhaps as more publishers realize readers are paying attention, they will start offering useful and more transparent information and pricing, and everyone will win.

   I suspect the lack of perceived value by poor pricing policies leads to more piracy, so maybe once everyone understands what they are really getting for their money, readers will be more willing to pay.

   Again, great job at tackling a big subject!

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     Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 1:04 pm

     Hi EM

     Thanks again for sending me your post. t’s a pity that only authors (except for me) commented. At least here there’s a much broader cross section of commenters and as you can see, most of the readers are interested in word count because we realize that page count (except in print maybe) is not worth anything.

     It seems like an easy solution to post word counts and I hope that more and more M/M epublishers do so. It’s up to them if they want to post the PDF count in addition to the word count for those who want it.

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   sarah Reply March 4, 2011 at 1:28 pm

   This is my admittedly unscientific way of checking for book length. I generally don’t buy from the publisher but from Amazon and they usually list file size (KB) for each book. This usually gives me a general idea if this is a novel or not. I usually find between 300 to 900 KB to consistently turn out to be a reasonably sized novel for me.

   I’ll also glance at some reviews which inevitably will tell me how short or long it is (ex: Wow, so much story in 40 pages, this was 200 pages of hell etc.) If any of the books are in print, I’ll look at the pages in the paperback or hardcover version. Also, almost all the authors have some kind of web page and they’ll generally list which books are novellas, short stories or novels.

   I don’t see consistency in price based on book size. Books recently published generally are more expensive than older ones no matter their size. I’ve found for myself that Samhain published novels consistently have the best prices, with some of their longest novels cheaper than what others charge for short stories. Carina will sometimes have decent discounts as well.

   As for the point of your article, I think an industry standard showing word count would be great as the length of a novel is something I consider when purchasing a book.

   • 9.1

     

     Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 2:44 pm

     Hi Sarah
     An excellent way to find out about page/word count is to read reviews but if the publisher doesn’t list word count we can’t provide it unless the book is sold through a re-seller, and that takes about 4 – 6 weeks after release.

     As for the point of your article, I think an industry standard showing word count would be great as the length of a novel is something I consider when purchasing a book.

     Some publishers volunteer the word count and it wouldn’t take any effort for the rest of them to do so, because they already have this information. It would also give some transparency to this whole exercise, and readers would know what they are getting for their money in terms of length at least.

     Quality, now that’s a different issue altogether.

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    Jenre Reply March 4, 2011 at 1:46 pm

    Interesting post, Wave.

    I’m one reader who is interested in word count. When Tam and I set up Brief Encounters Reviews I did a sweep of the main pubs to find out what they considered a short story so that we could set a word limit on the stories we would review. We ended up going for the top limit for what was considered a short (or novelette) of 20,000 words which I think was Torquere Press. Even then, the prices charged from pub to pub, and on a story which is 18,000 words there can be as much as $2-3 difference in price which I find astounding.

    What bothers me most though is the distinction between a ‘short novel’, a ‘novel’, and an ‘extended novel’. I find that sometimes publishers lump everything into the ‘novel’ category and so I am paying $8-9 for something which barely scrape the 40,000 word mark. If I know the word count then these meaningless labels are made concrete and I know exactly how many words per dollar I’m spending. That way I can choose whether I want to buy that book or not.

    • 10.1

      

      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:07 pm

      Hi Jen

      I think we (readers) need some consistency in this market which seems to be run by everyone. One would think that publishers would get together and agree on some basic principles (not about pricing and specials of course), but generally what constitutes a novel or novella in terms of word count since that’s probably what most of us buy. Shouldn’t be too hard to do.

      With rising prices we all want to know that we’re getting value for money and when I pay $10 for an ebook it’s time for a gut check.

      Each publisher charges a different price for basically the same size book but they call it something you can’t compare anywhere else. However if they each used the same word count we would be able to do some comparison shopping. WOW! I now see the rationale. lol.

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    Val Kovalin Reply March 4, 2011 at 1:57 pm

    Very interesting article. I’m another reader interested in wordcount, and I appreciate Amber Quill always showing it. It took a while for me to let go of the concept of total paper-pages and attach meaning to wordcounts, but now I have good idea of how long it will take me to read various wordcounts, and I find it valuable info.

    On an unrelated note, what’s with the emoticons turning from yellow to green? It looks like we’ve all developed food-poisoning or something!

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      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:56 pm

      Hi Val
      This whole issue of wordcount vs. page count has been bothering me for a while and I wondered about the lack of consistency by publishers. I corresponded with a few of them to find out why they weren’t listing word count and those who refused had no reason – they just didn’t feel it was necessary for readers to have this information. I don’t believe we are unreasonable to ask for it and since it’s available why not provide it?

      I know what you mean about giving up paper count but it was unreliable to begin with anyway. Once you move to a Kindle or some other ereader (I’m sure you have one, Miss Tech) lol, you’ll give up paper count altogether.

      The green emoticons are Christian’s idea of having fun. I think he needs more work on the site since it’s obvious he’s bored.

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    S.L. Armstrong Reply March 4, 2011 at 2:04 pm

    I thought I’d poke my nose in and comment with regards to our press.

    Anything under 20,000 words is priced at $0.99.

    Anything between 20,000 words and 50,000 words is priced between $1.99 and $3.99 depending on length.

    Anything over 50,000 words, we automatically offer in a print version as well as ebook, and the ebook cost is half the cost of the print book. So, Catalyst‘s print book is $9.99, and the ebook is $4.99. Our range for ebook novels is $4.99 to $9.99 (based on length of manuscript, though I can’t see us ever publishing something whose print cost would be $20+).

    We approached pricing based on our own buying habits, actually. I won’t pay $3+ for a 5K word piece. I actual chafe at being expected to pay $9.99 for any ebook. My personal price break point is $7.99, and that $7.99 ebook better be long, detailed, imaginative, and downright awesome, or I’m going to be really, really ticked off. And I have walked away from sales before many time due to pricing. While I don’t believe in the $0.99 novel (as I feel it devalues the artist’s work), I do feel that paying mass market price for a 50K word ebook is downright ludicrous.

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      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 4:27 pm

      Hi Saundra
      I wish that more of your colleagues felt like you do but I suppose they have to pay royalties to their authors, and a $3.99 novel doesn’t cut it.

      I don’t quibble so much at ebook pricing until it reaches $8.99. Your point about ebooks costing more than mass market paperbacks is correct, but for those of us who are trying not to accumulate more paper, even an expensive ebook is a good alternative. However it gets ridiculous when we don’t know the word count and the publisher wants $9.99 for a “supernovel.”

      Maybe we’ll move the yardstick today but I don’t think so unless the publishers are really committed to the much vaunted customer service they talk about all the time. What the customers want is not going to cost them any money so why not do it. Hell, people on this site ask for enhancements and we install them and no money changes hands.

      Thanks for stopping by Saundra. Where’s your sidekick?

      • …

        

        S.L. Armstrong Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:20 pm

        I wish that more of your colleagues felt like you do but I suppose they have to pay royalties to their authors, and a $3.99 novel doesn’t cut it.

        Even when we contract with authors, these are the prices we agree to, and split royalties 50/50 with them. Since we generate our ebooks in-house, our overhead is negligible. I think the difference is that the goal of our press is to value quality over quantity and author satisfaction over the bottom line.

        Storm Moon Press is primarily a labor of love for us; our goal is for the press to pay for itself rather than to make a huge profit. That allows us to take a few gambles that larger presses focused on profitability might not have the opportunity to.

        Ultimately, choosing a price point is a calculated balance of several factors. On the one hand, some people mentally equate “inexpensive” with “cheap” and won’t buy something if the price is too low, on the assumption that something must be “wrong” with it. On the other, keeping prices lower means less risk for the consumer, allowing them to take a gamble on an author/story they might not have chanced buying had it cost more.

        YMMV, of course. This is the way we approach pricing, and we recognize that other presses have other considerations.

        And the sidekick is out picking up the cape from the dry cleaners.

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    Jordan Reply March 4, 2011 at 2:10 pm

    Whew, what a relief that I did something logical for JCP Books like follow the SFWA’s standards. Up until that novel price point anyway. As a consumer I would feel ripped off if I paid a publisher’s top price for a 40k word book and was told it was a “novel,” regardless of what SFWA says. It was useful to have some standards to go by for short/novelette/novella though without reinventing the wheel.

    I’m glad to hear more readers are looking at word count rather than page count. I think a couple of years ago when PDF was more the norm, readers still wanted page count regardless of the fact that they might have different page sizes, different fonts and point sizes, different margins, etc. I still provide page count because I think some people just want an idea if it’s a 50-page or 250-page story.

    I have noticed lately in big publishing for print, certain books I’ve read have been typeset so that they look longer than they actually are. (And then no doubt people think, wow, her prose is a really quick and engaging read! I flew through that book in one night!) A few years ago most fiction averaged about 250 words or more per page. A particularly widely spaced typesetting job I noticed recently made me curious, so I counted, and there were less than 200 words per page. So they were making that book look 20% longer than it really was just by the typesetting.

    Overall, if you go read a book that was printed 20 years ago, the text will look denser, so there has been a shift in aesthetics toward more airily spaced typography. But with a few popular authors I’ve noticed the spacing and margins of the text block goes beyond aesthetics and into subterfuge.

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      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:41 pm

      Jordan

      Readers more and more are asking for word count instead of or in additiion to page count because they realize what a shell game PDF page count is. Like the book I bought that was 72 pages – it was 1-1/2 line spacing and wide margins, but no matter how they tried it didn’t look like a novel.

      I know that publishers run a business but epublishing is earning a lot of money for the pubs so why can’t they give the readers something – like the ability to determine value for money by giving us the word count of their books?

      I don’t read a lot of print books now due to a lack of space but I noticed that print books were easier to read with wider margins, and the print was more open. I thought it was because of my new glasses. lol.

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    Reggie Reply March 4, 2011 at 2:18 pm

    Thanks for taking on another issue for us readers!

    Could someone clarify which press S.L. Armstrong is referring too?

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      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 2:37 pm

      Hi Reggie

      My pleasure Reggie.

      Saundra’s Press is Storm Moon Press. It’s pretty small so you might not have heard of it before. If you click on “S.L. Armstrong” you will be taken to the publisher’s site.

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      S.L. Armstrong Reply March 4, 2011 at 2:50 pm

      Sorry about that. It’s been a looong day for me, and it’s not even 3pm. XD

      It is Storm Moon Press. We’ve been around just over a year now, but we’re still growing. Nothing wrong with small!

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        Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:30 pm

        Saundra
        There is absolutely nothing wrong with small. I get a lot of books from JCP Books which probably started around the same time as Storm Moon Press.

        • …

          

          S.L. Armstrong Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:49 pm

          Everyone has to start somewhere, right?

          I actually find these discussions incredibly interesting and informative. It’s good to know people’s opinions and thresholds so that, as a small business, I can better cater to the customer.

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    Ingrid Reply March 4, 2011 at 2:34 pm

    I always check word count and/or price. Because I stopped buying short stories and novella’s have to be from a trusted writer or 5+ dik before I buy them.

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      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 4:17 pm

      Hey Ingrid

      I know that you love books that start at 100K. lol I’m not there yet so there’s some subterfuge in trying to find out the word count before I put down my money. I have just started Jordan’s GhosTV and I know it will probably take me about a week to do a good job but that one will be a pleasure.

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        Ingrid Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:02 pm

        I just do not think short stories are worth their money. To me they feel overpriced for the kind of enjoyment I get out of them

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    Becky Black Reply March 4, 2011 at 2:45 pm

    K.Z. Snow makes a good point there about word count not always being meaningful to readers the way it is to writers. I should ask some of my none writer friends about how many words there are in an everage novel, or how many pages they’d expect something 80,000 words to be?

    But the whole subject of ebook pricing is a minefield. I’ve had a Kindle for about three months now and have found the price of books is all over the map, and the variation in the pricing points of the different publishers you cite just shows that.

    • 16.1

      

      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:28 pm

      Becky
      I have reviewed many books that are 90K which run just over 300 pages but page count is very subjective (and I think everyone gave examples of why this is) so I prefer to go by the word count. Most reviewers do as well. Readers are more and more looking for word count because they have been burned often by PDF or ePub page counts which vary widely.

      As for the Kindle, it doesn’t list anything except “locations” which is frustrating when you first start using it but eventually you figure out the size of the books.

      But the whole subject of ebook pricing is a minefield

      This is why more and more readers are comparison shopping to get value for their money and why word count is so important. Of course, as I said before, word count has nothing to do with the quality of what’s between the covers, but that’s another story.

      • …

        

        sarah Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:47 pm

        Kindle 3 was recently upgraded and now shows page numbers as well as location. I’ve noticed it’s not all on all the books I have, but I’ve definitely seen it on some. Maybe publishers will start putting out the number of pages in their ebooks.

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    Angela James Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:04 pm

    I am on vacation. You wouldn’t believe the number of urgent, time-sensitive emails I get while on vacation (and how hard it is not to check my email and answer them), but I do provide the email of my backup contact that anyone is always free to use if they need something before my return!

    But since I’m blog hopping, this doesn’t count and I can answer

    At Carina, our prices are word count based like this:

    15-25k: $2.99
    26-50k: $3.99
    50-75k: $4.99
    75+ : $5.99

    The exception to that pricing is when we do books in collections, and the collections (which would contain 3 or more novellas) would be higher priced or if we choose to experiment with pricing and make a book a loss leader, for example. Also, if books are part of a collection, and being sold individually as well, we’ll price them all equal prices, the lowest common price, even if one story falls in a higher word count.

    Word count was included in our cover copy (blurbs) starting with January 2011. We have just updated all of the previous cover copy with the word count, as well, and that will be updated on the website sometime in March.

    I hope that answered some of your questions about Carina pricing (I haven’t seen your email). I’m happy to answer questions here in the comments!

    Angela James, Executive Editor

    • 17.1

      

      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:18 pm

      Hi Angela
      I got an “out of the office answer b/c you were on vacation” to my email.

      My question related to the inconsistency in having word counts for some books but not all. When I checked the blurbs for some of your books yesterday on your website less than half had the word count.

      BTW your pricing structure is great and when you add sales on top of that I’m only sorry that you don’t have more M/M romances.

      I’m really happy to hear that all of your books listed on your website will include the word counts starting this month. That’s great news and I hope that other publishers who are still indecisive about whether this is a good thing will follow suit.

      Thanks for spending time with us on your vacation.

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    Jaye Valentine Reply March 4, 2011 at 3:18 pm

    Holy Hot Button, Batman!

    For e-books, word count is the only method by which you can compare the length of one book in relation to another book. Page count is entirely irrelevant in e-books because of the aforementioned variables: font size, font style, margin size, and line spacing.

    Page numbers are also irrelevant (as is the book title/author name on every page), yet some publishers still insist on embedding them in the headers and footers of their master documents. I find it more than mildly infuriating when e-publishers clings so hard to print standards in regard to formatting that are, once again, completely irrelevant in e-books.

    One of the things I have on my to-do list is to include the word count in the product description area at the end of the blurb on all sites where our books are sold, if that site doesn’t already display a word count. This would include Amazon, which only displays the size of the book file in kilobytes, which tells you exactly jack shit as far as the length of the book in concerned.

    In regard to Tam’s comment about books costing the higher price even if the count is only a couple words over the lower price’s upper threshold, bear in mind that automatic word counting is not the exact science you might think. Word count will have some variance depending on the program the publisher uses to make the count, and even how the individual counter’s modifiable settings are configured. Google Documents’ count is never the same as MS Word, and neither of those are the same as Scrivener, NetOffice, etc. Some programs count hyphenated compound words as one word, while others count each component of the hyphenated word as unique words, and others like Google Documents, I don’t even know. The count line has to be drawn somewhere for pricing, so I always use the same program with the same settings to get my counts. If I would count that same book in another program, I might be way over or way under that number. I understand where Tam is coming from with that point, but a line has to be drawn. It’s just not practical to do anything but have a schedule and adhere to it globally.

    As for cost/words . . . Yeah. I have a kinky little short story called Happily Ever Before that’s 3,000 words long, and the publisher put it on Amazon at $2.99. Ouch. As soon as I became aware of this (by way of a nastygram from a justifiably irate reader), I contacted the publisher and requested that the price be reduced to 99 cents everywhere the title was offered for sale.

    Like KZ said, if 30K = novel, I’ve written a lot more of them than I thought. I can’t in all good conscience call anything below 55,000 words a novel. And Sips and Nibbles and Rendezvous and Naps and other cute monikers tell me the same jack shit Amazon’s file size does. All our books are marked on our website with both the length label (novel, novella, or short story—I don’t see any need or benefit for umpteen sub-categories), along with a rounded-down word count. One of our books, at 52,000 words, is marketed as a novel by the publisher, but I list it on our website as a novella. Close to my personal, novel-word-count threshold, but not close enough. But a 30,000-word novel? No way.

    I understand that publishers, as business owners, have to make decisions based on what they feel is best to grow and maintain their business. As an author, I don’t always have to agree with those decisions. As consumers, readers already know where their power lies.

    All IMHO, and YMMV. And now I have to go finish editing an interview before a certain blogger pokes me in the ‘nads with a pointy stick.

    –Jaye

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      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:30 pm

      Hi Jaye

      For e-books, word count is the only method by which you can compare the length of one book in relation to another book

      I wish all publishers are reading your comment because some of them probably think we have some devious plan as to why we want to know the word counts of books we purchase. As you said, any other measurement is irrelevant.

      One of the things I have on my to-do list is to include the word count in the product description area at the end of the blurb on all sites where our books are sold

      If more authors do this we may end up not needing the publishers to disclose this information, but many authors complain that the publishers change their blurbs anyway so this might not fly for everyone.

      Unfortunately, even though readers do have some power what if my favourite author is with a publisher that refuses to disclose word count? I’m screwed and not in a good sense.

      In terms of word count being different depending on whether you use Google Docs. Word or any number of word processing programs, as long as we get a number I’m okay with that. As for the cut off points -they are there for a reason and I understand that reason. I just have to pay more because of an arbitrary cut off point.

      I haven’t read Happily Ever Before – I have to check it out, especially at .99 cents. lol

      And now I have to go finish editing an interview before a certain blogger pokes me in the ‘nads with a pointy stick.

      You have until midnight tonight before the pointy stick comes out.

    • 18.2

      

      Jules Jones Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:59 pm

      And $2.99 cover price for 5 kwords is why I’m now reluctant to submit short stories to markets where they’ll get published as stand-alones. I know how I’d feel as a reader about that, and I don’t want my readers feeling that way about me.

      • …

        

        EM Lynley Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:24 pm

        Good points. I do think it’s important for readers to understand that there is only so much story/plot one can fit into 5k words. I often see people rating shorts low, saying there wasn’t enough story. Well, honestly, only really talented writers can manage to fit a proper story (beginning, middle and end) into 5k words and have a satisfying, sensible storyline. Otherwise, they are expecting a bit too much, and may be happier with longer stories or short novellas.

        But I’d be happy to see all of my short pieces at 99cents each. People don’t think twice about buying 99cent items and are less likely to feel cheated if they aren’t happy. That takes some of the pressure off writers who excel at the really short story.

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    amaryllis Reply March 4, 2011 at 4:03 pm

    Page count, word count…just don’t call it a “novel” if it is less than 70,000 words. Like a lot of readers, I want an actual book when I go to read a book, not a short story. 50,000 is a short story. 90,000+ is a NOVEL. The poor writers don’t stand a chance anyway…many “readers” of this genre balk at a book longer than 200 pages…which is not a book. I blame short attention spans and readers looking for porn.

    • 19.1

      

      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 6:24 pm

      Hi Amaryllis
      Very few pubs list novels starting at 70K lol. I think 50K is the most you can hope for. I don’t think looking for books that are 40K is because of short attention spans or looking for porn – maybe some readers have problems with their eyes – I do.

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    Jules Jones Reply March 4, 2011 at 4:09 pm

    If you want a little more hard data, I’ve always put the word length (to the nearest 1000 words for long titles and nearest 100 for shorts) on my bibliography page, along with the publication date.

    I’ve got some shorts sitting on my hard drive because I’m disinclined to put a 5k story on the market at the sort of price the publishers have to charge to cover their credit card processing costs. Fictionwise charges a more realistic price for its reprinted shorts, but a) they’re reprints, b) Fictionwise has a pricing/payment system that allows it to sell titles at 49c without seeing the entire cover price swallowed up in credit card processing fees.

    That bibliography page is out of date — I need to spend some time this weekend pruning dead links. And thinking about self-publishing options for the out-of-print shorts.

    • 20.1

      

      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:47 pm

      Hi Jules
      Many readers love shorts and you might want to look into Smashwords which is an Indie publisher of new books, as well as Fictionwise.

      • …

        

        Jules Jones Reply March 5, 2011 at 10:33 am

        Wandering slightly off-topic — I’d be interested in a discussion about which of the self-publishing options *readers* find easiest to use. I could and should experiment with them myself, but I have a minority ereader (an elderly Cybook) and what works for me may not work for Kindle or Sony users.

        (I loooove FeedBooks for my public domain reading needs. So easy to set up a custom pdf format for my preferred font and point size, before I flashed the Cybook to read epub.)

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    Sherry F (from the Midwest) Reply March 4, 2011 at 4:11 pm

    To answer the question in the title….no. Many times, I *don’t* feel that I’ve received my moneys worth.

    I base my purchases on tried and true authors and word count. As mentioned, page count is relatively worthless because I have some books with small “pages” where each margin is wider than the actual print.

    The word count is at least a very basic guideline for me. I read very fast so I think hard before I “waste” my time on anything less than 75K word count.

    Yes, it irritates me beyond belief when I get to the end of the story and realize that the page count indicates 25 left as they have included chapters from new (and sometimes even previous books!) by the author. I feel horribly misled and that I’ve been totally ripped off.

    That they may have higher prices for some authors doesn’t surprise me as I had already assumed that. Publishers (and maybe some authors) should be aware, though, that there truly are limits and there will probably be a time where they overprice something and they find few takers.

    For comparison, I love Nike sneakers; they feel wonderful to me and I’m in absolute heaven whenever I try them on. But they have priced themselves past what I’m willing to pay. And I no longer buy Nike sneakers.

    Great article, Wave. A lot of pondering to do for a Friday, though.

    And I am going to include the emoticon that best describes my day today.

    • 21.1

      

      Josephine Myles Reply March 4, 2011 at 4:55 pm

      That boosting the page count by extras at the end really aggravates me as well. I’ve read things that have had over 20 extra pages tacked on. I think I have another chapter and then wham! The story is over before I was ready. Most frustrating.

    • 21.2

      

      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:54 pm

      Hi Sherry

      Although this post was not directly related to pricing, indirectly it does touch on it because publishers charge based on categorization of their books which in turn is based on book length.

      I tried in this post to find out if readers were interested in word count as one basis for their ebook purchases, and in this economy of course many of us are. But that’s not the only criteria I use – I have my favourite authors and I guess I would buy a book written by them regardless of price. However I hear what you’re saying about Nike pricing themselves out of the market.

      Sorry to give you a lot of pondering on a Friday evening. lol.

      Where did you get that emoticon? That is so cool.

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    patty o Reply March 4, 2011 at 4:36 pm

    To me novel length is 65,000 words or more, so if an ebook is 100,000+ words I don’t mind paying more. But nothing ticks me off more the buying what a publisher calls a novel and it’s only 40,000 words and I end up paying 6.99 for it. I’m all for everyone making money, but a little honesty goes along way.

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    Megan Reply March 4, 2011 at 4:39 pm

    I always check the word counts, and I do feel that many publishers overprice their books. My self-imposed, fairly arbitrary minimum is 5000 words per dollar. As a result I almost never buy short stories anymore. I do buy novellas, especially if I want something I can read in a few hours. I much prefer novels, and when I say “novel” I mean more than 50,000 words – preferably a LOT more. I like long books with actual room for the story to develop, but even for the long ones I feel pain at paying more than I would for a mass market paperback (US prices). If a book costs more than 6 bucks I wait for it to be available on allromanceebooks and use my freebie on it.

    • 23.1

      

      EM Lynley Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:31 pm

      Megan,
      These are great points about the depth of a story at 50k or 90k and one which some publishers don’t necessarily realize. The topic crosses into one of editing, which Wave and have discussed at length, and which will be addressed in a future post here by Josh Lanyon.

      Would you believe there are publishers which put word-count limits on authors, forcing them to cram their story into a neat little box? That accounts for some (not all) of the two-dimensional characters and weak storylines, lack of a fully fleshed out universe and backstory, secondary plots and much more. When you have to cut words, you lose a lot of those things that make the longer works so much more satisfying. And readers will fell okay paying a little bit more for a significatntly more satisfying read.

      My stories always end up longer than I expect and they wouldn’t be any good if I had to keep them to the original word count. But I don’t want to open that can of worms just yet or Wave will ban me.

    • 23.2

      

      amaryllis Reply March 4, 2011 at 6:04 pm

      Like Samhain, for instance. They allow only 90,000 words and will not look at anything over that. They also do not provide story editing of any kind. In it for the quick dollar.
      The author who can write a real novel is doomed from the start when all the ebook publishers are like that. There are a few-thankfully-who still PREFER a real book

      • …

        

        Ally Blue Reply March 4, 2011 at 6:50 pm

        Actually Samhain takes up to 120K for romance and is looking at up to 100K for the new horror line:
        http://www.samhainpublishing.com/general-information/
        Also, the editing process is pretty rigorous. At least MY editor puts me through the ringer. I can’t speak for anyone else, of course.

        As a reader, I prefer longer and more complex stories myself, most of the time. And, yeah, as a reader I do want to know the word count before I buy.

      • …

        

        Lex Valentine Reply March 4, 2011 at 8:43 pm

        I’m pretty sure Samhain DOES provide editing since a number of Samhain authors that I know have editors and go through edits.

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    Josephine Myles Reply March 4, 2011 at 4:53 pm

    I have to admit, I was going to buy a short story from Amber Allure recently, but when I looked at the price I balked. $4 for under 20k seemed like a lot of money when other publishers offer novel length for $5.50. I know it’s the quality of the story that counts, but sometimes my wallet can’t handle my reading habit – especially with shorts. I’m sure more people would buy them if they were more realistically priced.

    • 24.1

      

      EM Lynley Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:17 pm

      Jo,
      Your comment got my attention. As a former professional economist, I totally agree with you: slightly lower prices will generally lead to more sales, even when readers end up spending more in total. Every first year econ student knows this: marginal cost is important. There is a famous story of an econ professor who wrote a textbook and asked for the publisher to lower the price so he could sell more copies (though increasing total revenue and royalties) and the pub refused.

      Personally, as both an author and a voracious reader, I’d like to see prices lowered so readers can buy more stories. When my reading outpaced my budget I had to resort to the public library, even if it meant I had to wait months for best sellers. I hope publishers will be paying attention and learning a few things from everyone’s comments!

      • …

        

        Sherry F (from the Midwest) Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:48 pm

        Professional economist? I’ve just always been called a tight-a** and not in the flattering way. :freu:

    • 24.2

      

      Megan Reply March 5, 2011 at 7:30 am

      Amber Quill base prices are frankly outrageous to me, but ironically that doesn’t mean I don’t buy their titles. In fact I do, but only directly from them. They always have a “sale” going, which is usually 25% off novels and novellas, and all new releases are 35% for the first week. So I never purchase their titles through resellers where I’d have to pay full price. But I also very rarely buy short stories from them, because those usually aren’t discounted except for the first week, and even then the price usually breaks my 5k-per-dollar-minimum rule.

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    Shirley Ann Reply March 4, 2011 at 5:46 pm

    I’ve never noticed word count until today thank you for bringing it to my attention. I’ve just checked a couple of sites and wow the difference is stunning and the pricing is way out at a lot of sites. But will they change their prices? I don’t think so.

    Because my budget is small if the book is too much money at the publishers site I buy it elsewhere for a lower price or get it as one of my free books at ARE. I don’t like to do this but when a book is $8.99 and on another site with a similar word count is $5.99 you don’t really have a choice.
    

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    Kim W. Reply March 4, 2011 at 6:55 pm

    I don’t know if Samhain still follows these prices, but once upon a time they had the following posted on their site.

    Short Stories: $2.50 12,000 to 18,000 words
    Novellas: $3.50 18,001 to 35,000 words
    Category: $4.50 35,001 to 60,000 words
    Novel: $5.50 60,001 to 100,000 words
    Plus Novel: $6.50 over 100,000 words

    • 26.1

      

      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:27 pm

      Samhain might still follow their previoous pricing structure but they don’t publish the word count of each book on their site. We make assumptions based on their classifications.

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    S. Reply March 4, 2011 at 7:30 pm

    Another interesting post, Wave. I used to buy novellas, but I got burnt out – I’m just not the type to enjoy less than 30k words per story. I will still buy novellas if I trust the author (like auto-buy authors), but I don’t think I’ll pick up novellas from authors I don’t recognize.

    Books (esp. in this genre) are luxury goods to me, which means I pretty much have a set amount I choose to spend on them. In other words, I won’t pay 4-6 USD on novellas. It’s just not enough bang for the buck. (and no, no horrible pun intended, i am one who skips sex scenes if they’re too frequent in the story ). In general, I like my books to be greater than 50k words.
    Heck, I don’t mind if the author takes a year to write them, just gimme a long, well-plotted, engaging story.

    ETA: Wow, the comment spaces do not like greater than and less than signs.

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    Diane NYC Reply March 4, 2011 at 7:38 pm

    I didn’t realize there was such a rigid connection between word count and price. I thought it was based more on the popularity of the author, series or genre.

    I take length into consideration when I make a purchase but that’s because I read short or long stories based on my mood. When it comes to price, a good review influences me far more than word count.

    • 28.1

      

      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:23 pm

      Hi Diane
      I buy many books where the price is disproportionate to the length of the story, even when I know the word count, and is usually because I like the author or the premise of the story.

      As you said, a good review or word of mouth rec. is another reason why I buy books.

      I guess as a reader I just want to be able to make an informed decision about the length of the stories I buy. Now quality — that’s something else.

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    Cosmonaut Reply March 4, 2011 at 7:57 pm

    I generally check word counts before buying a book. I hate paying 3, 4 dollars for a book that takes 10, 20 minutes to read. If it’s one of my auto-buy authors I usually just buy without worrying about WC. I’ll even (and this is the penny-pusher/math geek in me) open the computer calculator to figure out the words/$. For the most part if the number is less than 7,000 I don’t buy or wait for a sale.

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    Finn Marlowe Reply March 4, 2011 at 8:14 pm

    Word Count Please! I want to know what I’m getting for my money and word count is the only way I can compare ebooks. And I wish they’d only include the word count of the story I’m buying, not the promo stuff often included with it.

    I just paid $9.99 for a m/m e-book – I almost died (but at least it’s a novel and a good one, at that) If I paid that for 30,000-40,000 words, I think flames would erupt from my head.

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    Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 8:19 pm

    I read this post with great interest because the price of ebooks is something I go back and forth on. I’m not sure it’s quite so simple as word count versus page breakdown, though. In fact, I’m quite sure it’s not.

    I mean, lard and butter weigh approximately the same, but what do you want to spread on your bagel? It’s not just a matter of weights and measurements.

    If you want a lot of short snappy dialog — the kind of thing I write, for example — it takes up page space but not word count. But, assuming you like short snappy dialog, you’re still going to prefer a story with shorter overall word count but better dialog, to a story with, say, higher word count but maybe bloated, dull dialog?

    So to some extent quality versus quantity has to calculate into a book buyer’s decisions.

    Second point…and I guess this gets into our different economic philosphies and ethics, but not every publisher invests in quality artwork, decent editing, decent copyediting, decent formatting. These things cost money. Publishers who don’t pay for these things can afford to charge less. Publishers who pay a fair wage to their editors and others will probably have to charge more — taking into account such variables as the size of the publishing house. Readers can rejoice upfront at paying less, but you get what you pay for. I don’t know many readers rejoicing because they saved money on shabby copyediting and poor cover art.

    Third point — in the world of ebooks, third party vendors take a huge chunk of change right off the top. If authors are to be able to make enough money for writing to be something more than a fun hobby, the books have to cost enough so that everyone can still make money after the folks at Fictionwise, etc. take their piece of the action.

    Yet another thing that we’re dealing with –or at least should consider — is how much pirating is costing us all. The people who get their books for free are doing it at the expense of authors, publishers, and the people who pay for their stories.

    I’m not advocating gouging readers, but I do want to earn a fair wage for the work I do. I don’t want to be rich (well, I do, but I don’t expect that to happen anytime soon), but I want to be able to afford to continue writing fulltime. I work damn hard at my craft and if we were to break it down by the hours I put in…well, it’s better if I don’t think about it that way.

    Maybe we should think about the way mainstream print handles this dilemma.

    You’ll easily pay $5.99 – 6.99 for a 50K mainstream print paperback. (What are the 55K Harlequin categories going for these days?) We could streamline it as mainstream print publishing does where you can’t even buy novellas separately so you’re paying $7.00 for two stories you aren’t interested in, in order to get hold of the one novella you do.

    As for the mainstream approach to ebook publishing, the aim is to price everything at $9.99 or higher. On the one hand people complain that mainstream won’t publish to the taste of a relatively small audience, but on the other hand a relatively small audience is complaining that the people who *do* provide this speciality fiction can’t do it at mainstream prices. You’re not going to have it both ways. I don’t think in our particular genre the answer is as simple as X words = X $.

    • 31.1

      

      Teddypig Reply March 4, 2011 at 8:38 pm

      But Josh

      If you are selling lard you have to label it lard and sell it appropriately.

      If you sell butter then you label it as such.

      If the publisher feels that a certain author is not doing so well then maybe that’s the time not to buy the next offered book.

      To me this is a literal representation of a publishers backing of their choices in author’s books and what they are supposed to be doing professionally as a gatekeeper and editor and packager of product.

      Either you believe the author is worth the amount you want as a publisher for that word count or you don’t.

      If you don’t, then to me that is something that should not be so obvious to the public like in pricing of an author’s eBooks.

      This smells really bad not just for the reader getting gouged because most of these “hidden reasons” for raising of prices are not documented anywhere on any website but also for the author who has to find out and the publisher who does this type of arbitrary pricing.

      • …

        

        Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:19 pm

        I’d like to see standardization of what in our genre qualifies as short story, novella, novel — that would simplify life for everyone. But since mainstream can’t agree on that one, it’s probably not going to happen here either.

        I don’t think it’s a matter of a particular publisher feeling a particular author doesn’t sell so well.

        I think it’s more like publishing houses that pay for things like editing and beautiful artwork probably have to charge a higher price for their product — unless they are so large and they sell so much product that they can afford to keep prices very low.

        Supply and demand.

        We’re selling and buying a specialty product here and usually when you’re buying something of a specialty nature, you end up paying more.

        Again, I’m not advocating gouging readers — I hope we never succumb to the $9.99 take it or leave it price line — but I do think that word count alone doesn’t take into account dialog — books heavy on dialog chalk up a lot of pages without chalking up a lot of word count necessarily.

        Also self-publishing is going to entirely change this dynamic as more and more authors opt for DIY.

        • …

          

          Teddypig Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:28 pm

          If publishing houses are running a business they should have already accounted for those “costs” per book and priced all of them before they even started appropriately based on word count.

          That is the nature of business.

          That quote from Noble Romance Publishing saying “certain” authors are simply worth more is a whole different kettle of fish.

          That’s obviously taking advantage of the situation to pad the bottom line.

          • …

            

            Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:11 pm

            If publishing houses are running a business they should have already accounted for those “costs” per book and priced all of them before they even started appropriately based on word count.

            That is the nature of business.

            Sure. But everyone’s not going to have the same costs. Some houses will have editors on staff, some will rely on freelancers, and some will rely on the authors. Some houses page a wage, some pay bonuses, and in a few cases some pay in free books and kind words. So what it costs House A to produce a novella may be twice what it costs House B.

            As a writer I’m uncomfortable with the idea of my work being priced based on my popularity. I guess that’s supply and demand reduced to its most brutal basics, but that’s taking those “soft” values too far.

          • …

            

            Teddypig Reply March 5, 2011 at 6:20 am

            Josh they could just pay you an advance and not gouge the reader. That model is not new and it is accepted in the industry to provide the author a sum of money without raising eyebrows.

            My thing is if they need to “cover cost” for whatever server maintenance or electricity or cat food then they need to raise whatever their prices are for all eBooks they have not jack up the price on just a few eBooks they think will sell.

    • 31.2

      

      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:11 pm

      Josh
      I’m not suggesting that publishers not pay their writers appropriate royalties. All I was questioning was why some publishers didn’t publish the word count of their ebooks. I mentioned in the post that the word count had nothing to do with the quality of what was between the covers.

      This is what I said about you to the owner of Noble Publishing when we discussed some of her ebook pricing strategies:

      As far as pricing goes, again I don’t know of any epublisher that prices its books by subgenre. Since M/M is itself a subgenre I’m comparing all M/M authors, and if by your definition different M/M authors can command different prices for their work published by Noble Romance if they are more established, then Josh Lanyon who is one of the top authors of this subgenre and probably has one of the largest followings, should be able to command the highest prices for his books.

      A Vintage Affair by Josh that was released by Loose Id, which is 41K words, is priced at $5.95, the same price I paid for the 3 story anthology by Martin Delacroix who I do not consider to be in the same league as Josh, by any stretch of the imagination. Samhain charges $5.50 for Josh’s most recent novel, All she Wrote, which is 68K words.

      There was a lot more but you get the gist.

      Second point…and I guess this gets into our different economic philosphies and ethics, but not every publisher invests in quality artwork, decent editing, decent copyediting, decent formatting. These things cost money. Publishers who don’t pay for these things can afford to charge less. Publishers who pay a fair wage to their editors and others will probably have to charge more — taking into account such variables as the size of the publishing house. Readers can rejoice upfront at paying less, but you get what you pay for. I don’t know many readers rejoicing because they saved money on shabby copyediting and poor cover art.

      If authors don’t make enough on their books they won’t write any more. Everyone recognizes that, but that has nothing to do with the buyer’s need to know if the book they are getting is 30K or 100K. the buyer then has to determine if s/he is getting value for money based on two criteria – length of the story and quality of the content.

      Some publishers who provide the same services you quoted and are just as professional – they hire top staff for cover design and editing and related services – provide the word count, but others treat it as if it’s a trade secret until the book is sold by a reseller where the information is readily available.

      No one, least of all me, wants to denigrate the writing profession. All I was asking in this post is why only some publishers provide word count and what did the readers want. We know that page count is totally useless because it depends on many variables.

      When an ebook is priced at $10 I tend to look at print even though I don’t want more print books.

      It’s always wonderful to debate these issues with you Josh. Who is winning so far?

      • …

        

        Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:33 pm

        I know what you’re saying, Wave. I hope I don’t sound aggressive because that’s not my point. I just think this isn’t quite as black and white as it might seem.

        Part of why Samhain and Carina (I don’t know about Ellora’s Cave) can keep prices down is because they are larger and do sell a greater amount of product. It’s the same reason Starbucks can sell their crap product for less than the terrific indie coffee house down the street.

        (But now I sound like I’m saying Carina and Samhain publishing crap and that’s NOT at all what I’m saying — both houses do a terrific job of editing and cover art and etc.)

        Also, I totally lost track of this point earlier, but I do absolutely agree that word count should be published — but along with page count. Page count does…count. Word count on its own can be misleading if the book is heavy on dialog. I guess I’m aware of this because my books are often heavy on dialog and so I can struggle to hit a particular word count.

        I think we’re basically in agreement as far as making it clear to readers what they’re getting. I can’t see any reason for that — and I think standardizing formatting would be a super idea as well.

        As for the rest of it, some readers do simply not enjoy a shorter format, regardless of who the writer is. But it is funny to me that we get so locked into the idea of what a novel is based on word count versus content.

        • …

          

          Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:36 pm

          I think we’re basically in agreement as far as making it clear to readers what they’re getting. I can’t see any reason for that —

          I mean, I can’t see any valid reason for NOT providing that info. I’m typing too fast!

          • …

            

            Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:11 pm

            Aren’t you supposed to be writing a highly anticipated post? Are you going to be late? lol

            I did understand what you meant. Also we do provide both the word count where that is available, as well as the PDF page count whenever we review a book here. That’s part of the frustration – sometimes we can’t find the word count.

            I already figured out why Samhain, EC, Carina and a few other houses can offer lower prices while still providing a quality product.

            But it is funny to me that we get so locked into the idea of what a novel is based on word count versus content.

            I think I said many times in my comments and in the post that word count has nothing to do with the quality of what’s between the covers. Word count is only one measure for readers to make an informed decision of whether or not to buy a book, particularly when the author is an unknown. I buy many books that may not be considered good value from the perspective of length, but if I like an author’s work it doesn’t matter, until I hit the $10 ceiling for an ebook and then I think a few times before deciding to buy.

        • …

          

          S. Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:55 pm

          As for the rest of it, some readers do simply not enjoy a shorter format, regardless of who the writer is. But it is funny to me that we get so locked into the idea of what a novel is based on word count versus content.

          Err, can’t speak for everyone, but hmm, how do I put this delicately? (I can’t, sorry!) Short stories need to be streamlined (requires a lot more editing/skills from the writer). For example, in a long, wordy, not well edited piece, I can at least stumble upon some sections that I like. With a short story, it is what it is, and most of the time, after the skimming, there’s not much left? And I’m definitely not just isolating the m/m genre – I see the same issues even in the annual American Short Story anthologies. For me personally, that’s why I normally won’t take a risk with short stories unless I really really really trust the writer.

          ETA: This applies to short novellas, too, the stories that are in the 15k-25k range.

          • …

            

            Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:18 pm

            The short story is its own relatively rigid artform. We’re not seeing much of the traditional short story anymore except in literary fiction.

            I will say as a writer that one reason I’d prefer everything be clearly labeled because the last thing I want is a reader unhappy because s/he thought she was getting a novella and it’s only a short story.

            If they fail to read the description, that’s their problem. I happen to enjoy writing short works. But if they weren’t able to tell what the story was from the description, then their disappointment does bother me. I don’t want anyone feeling cheated.

        • …

          

          Jordan Reply March 5, 2011 at 8:15 am

          and I think standardizing formatting would be a super idea as well.

          Flowable text ebooks are moving toward a sort of standardization. With epubs based on XML, the main control on the publisher end is “this is body copy” and “this is a headline,” and the rest of the look and feel is theoretically controlled by the CSS of the user’s ereader, which is supposed to override any styling built into the file, and which readers can alter themselves in programs like Calibre.

          In terms of PDFs, though, I’d balk at anyone trying to standardize my typesetting. Who’d set the standards? What are their qualifications? What if I didn’t agree with them?

          My preference would be to just publish the word count and be transparent about it.

      • …

        

        Buda Reply March 5, 2011 at 12:48 am

        A Vintage Affair by Josh that was released by Loose Id, which is 41K words, is priced at $5.95, [...] Samhain charges $5.50 for Josh’s most recent novel, All she Wrote, which is 68K words.

        All this tells me is that Samhain seriously under-priced ASW. Seriously. I expected $7.99 for ASW. I was pleasantly surprised, of course, but wouldn’t have balked once at that price for a novel from Josh.

        Why? Because I know from experience that I will get the highest quality story-telling from him. Hell, I own 6 or 7 of his books in both electronic format and print, more than any other author in this genre/subgenre/whatever.

        I don’t want to get into a discussion about author/price stratification, but there are a select few I would pay premium prices to read. Alas, far too many don’t (yet?) fall into that category for me.

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      EM Lynley Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:18 pm

      Josh, you’ve brought up a lot of issues we haven’t discussed here: cover art and editing staff. Those are vital aspects of a good book, and explain why some prices may be higher from the publishers which put more time, effort and investment into those aspects.

      What I think Wave wanted to focus on is comparability across publishers and transparency in pricing. We all agree we’ll pay more for a better product, but until we’ve read it, we don’t know whether it’s worth whatever price we paid.

      I honestly have no idea about the costs of cover art or editing, though as a writer and reader I appreciate when my publisher works hard to excel about both, but as a reader, I also want to know how much book I’m getting as well. I can then decide if it meets my requirements for value.

      After seeing many discrepancies and differences, and recent reader comments about dissatisfaction with length/pricing I think it’s good to get the whole issue into a discussion and everyone can learn a thing or two: readers, writers and publishers.

      In reply to your comment about Christie and earlier writers: I have always noticed her paperbacks seemed “slimmer” than more recent authors, and while I was glad that meant they cost less, I never really thought about how much more story she managed to fit into a smaller package. But you have again hit the nail on the head. Thanks!

      • …

        

        Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:51 pm

        It’s a great topic because it ties into so many topics that we discuss here — or should be discussing — editing, artwork, etc. The whole issue of self-publishing. The boom in self-publishing and micro-presses. Is it a good thing? It’s an interesting development for sure.

        I’m all in favor of standardizing things like format — and again, I wasn’t arguing with the idea of posting word count. Just pointing out that we really do need both.

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      S.L. Armstrong Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:24 pm

      …not every publisher invests in quality artwork, decent editing, decent copyediting, decent formatting. These things cost money. Publishers who don’t pay for these things can afford to charge less… Readers can rejoice upfront at paying less, but you get what you pay for.

      Josh,

      This is an excellent demonstration of the point I was making to Wave up-thread. The mental perception that a lower price necessarily equates to an inferior product.

      I won’t say that this isn’t true in some cases, but a lower price isn’t a definite indicator of the quality of the product. We contract with professional editors and proofreaders who have experience in (and are avid readers of) our genre. We have a superb cover artist who creates original art that has been described as “among the best in the genre”. Our print book layouts are created by a professional typesetter, and our e-books are generated by a professional web developer.

      But because we have worked to cultivate relationships with professionals who understand and share our vision for our independent press, we are able to negotiate to keep our costs lower than they might be otherwise, which in turn, lets us keep the final price down.

      I’m not trying to start a fight here, just pointing out that one can’t always tell the quality of a product based solely on its price. (And since I’m one of the few micropresses who have popped up on this thread, I felt it necessary for me to weigh in on that particular misconception.) I do agree with your conclusion that a book’s value should be more than a simple cost per word analysis, though. Quality is a definite factor that should be considered. I simply disagree that quality and price are always positively correlated. There are, after all, quite a few e-presses who charge at or above the current genre averages but continue to produce substandard work.

      • …

        

        Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:56 pm

        I’m not trying to start a fight here, just pointing out that one can’t always tell the quality of a product based solely on its price.

        I agree in principle. In practice, I guess I’m more cynical. But it is certainly possible to find quality items for fair prices. I can’t argue that since I’m an author who gives away tons of free books — and you can’t get much better price than that. ;-D

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    Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 8:56 pm

    By the way, the 40-45K novel length is a hold over from an earlier age in publishing – primarily the 1930s – 1960s.

    During the golden age of mystery publishing, for example, many mystery novels fell in the 40-50K range. Storytelling was much leaner and tighter. Agatha Christie’s early novels are generally within that word length (to name just one well-known writer).

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      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:17 pm

      Since I’m an Agatha Christie fan I guess that’s why the ’40K novel’ seems so familiar to me. lol

      • …

        

        Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:59 pm

        I think Chandler’s stuff is pretty short too.

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    Lex Valentine Reply March 4, 2011 at 8:57 pm

    I’m not sure I even know what to say. Great article and topic, Wave. I’m afraid I’m not a lot of help though. As a writer, I write what I feel, what’s inside me and wants to be written. Sometimes it’s a 5K erotic short story. You can call it porn if you like. I prefer to think it’s erotic romance because I rarely ever write anything without a HEA.

    As a reader, I read what calls to me regardless of the price point although I must admit a couple of times I’ve looked at word count and price and then at the publisher and said, “I’ll pass.” I’m more likely to pay more money for books from presses where I can usually expect a quality product: EC, Samhain, Carina, Loose Id, MLR, Liquid Silver, and Pink Petal Books. I’m also more likely to pass on interesting books from presses where I’ve had a prior bad experience in terms of poor editing and poor writing.

    For the most part, I don’t pay much attention to the price unless something seems wildly inappropriate. I want what I want and I usually don’t care if it’s 3.99 or 7.99 if I want it badly enough.

    All of that being said, I never thought any of my books were priced inappropriately. My shorts (5-12K) are all around a 1.99. The novellas in the 15-30K range at around 3.99. The short novels at 40K or more at 4 or 5 bucks. And that’s across all my publishers (some of whom are mentioned here and some who are not.)I guess I’ll start paying closer attention to how much I’m spending when I whip out that PayPal debit card now.

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      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:26 pm

      Hi Lex
      Sometimes great books come in small packages. A long book does not mean that it’s a quality long book. I’ve said that over and over. I think what the readers are saying is that they want to know the word count before they buy.

      Poor editing doesn’t only happen with the smaller presses – but they are more frequent there because of a lack of properly trained editing staff and the tendency of some small presses to sign any writer who can string a few words together.

      I buy lots of shorts and it’s only when the price seems exorbitant that I stop and think whether the book is a good investment – both content wise and time wise.

      • …

        

        Lex Valentine Reply March 5, 2011 at 6:28 pm

        I agree with all that, Wave. And quite a few long books are so filled with pages of descriptors that don’t even move the story forward that unless I know the author’s work, I tend not to buy the long stuff. For all that I started out an Anne Rice fan, I got so tired of chapter after chapter of descriptors that did nothing to further the plot that I stopped reading her. Stopped respecting her writing as well.

        Word count doesn’t guarantee that you’ll get your money’s worth no matter what you spend. Even a freebie requires the expenditure of time and there’s a ton of books out there that are a waste of time unfortunately. However, I agree that publishers should give you plenty of information in order to entice you to purchase. Some people only buy if it’s X length. They won’t know it’s X length unless the publisher notes it on the website. It’s to the publisher’s advantage IMO to tell people what they can expect from a book in terms of length, genre, etc. The basics really. And it would be wonderful if RWA or EPIC came up with a standardization of lengths that publishers adhered to. Would make things easier for readers.

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    kkm Reply March 4, 2011 at 9:16 pm

    thank you! i hate that e-books and especially e-romances are much much shorter than paper books…
    :0(
    -kkm

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    Reggie Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:10 pm

    I started as a total newbie to ebooks of any genre about 3 years ago. I am not familiar with “fanfic” or free downloads. I accepted that I would be paying $$ for these ind. Releases and I had no idea about what quality of writing to expect. I just tried out different stuff. In mainstream presses you get to know the brand quality to expect from different lines, not here. I found publishers I liked but they didn’t have dependable standards. So word count was something quantifiable to look at. After trial and error I found that most authors of these indi pubs need about 70k words min to get the story told. So I wouldn’t even read the blurb on a novella or short novel. I’m mortified to confess, that although I saw Josh’s books I never looked closely ’cause they were “too short”. Based on the surrounding quality I didn’t think they could work at that length. Well, luckily for me I found this site and now I buy books off of reviews. I still am like Ingrid and gotta have my long books too. Yes, now that I know what I’m getting I would pay more for Josh’s books. But there is no way to publish with gravitas in the ebook realm (hardback).
    I still want to know word count because trust between readers and publishers is so low. I need all the info I can get in order to feel ok about pushing that “buy” button.

    If it weren’t for Wave and team, I would have already abandoned the indi ship!

    • 35.1

      

      Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:35 pm

      So I wouldn’t even read the blurb on a novella or short novel. I’m mortified to confess, that although I saw Josh’s books I never looked closely ’cause they were “too short”. Based on the surrounding quality I didn’t think they could work at that length.

      I think, glancing very quickly through the comments, that a number of readers feel the same way.

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    Josh Lanyon Reply March 4, 2011 at 10:26 pm

    Aren’t you supposed to be writing a highly anticipated post? Are you going to be late? lol

    I’m working on it! But I just finished a 45K spare little 1930s mystery of my own so I’m celebrating by getting into a big debate.

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      Wave Reply March 4, 2011 at 11:03 pm

      Congratulations Josh! When does this book release and who is the publisher?

      I’m really looking forward to your post on tuesday. You should gird your loins.

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    Enny Reply March 4, 2011 at 11:35 pm

    Hopefully this great post will give some publishers food for thought so that they changed these absolutely meaningless pdf page counts to word counts.

    But for me, the value of a book has very little to do with the number of words in it. It’s how the author manages to put those words together. I’ve read long novels that were an absolute waste of time and money and short stories that will stay with me for a long time. If a book is very good, I don’t care if it’s expensive. I’ll read it several times over and never regret the money I spent on it.

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      Megan Reply March 5, 2011 at 8:25 am

      This is very true, but unfortunately with e-books we have no way of knowing exactly what we’re getting quality-wise until we’ve paid for it and read it!

      With print books we can browse. We can read a couple of chapters in the store and get an idea of the author’s writing style and the quality of editing. Even on Amazon you can “see inside” a lot of books and read a fair number of pages.

      With e-books you get a blurb that may or may not accurately reflect the book’s content and a short excerpt. Sometimes the excerpt is a full chapter but it’s usually considerably shorter than that. I have been fooled by excerpts many times.

      Word count is far from the only consideration when deciding if I’m going to buy, but it is definitely nice to know especially for shorter works just because it is so difficult to get a quality story done in few words. Not that some authors can’t do it, but you don’t know that unless you’re familiar with the author…and the only way to become familiar is to read their books. Reviews are helpful but tastes vary – I’ve seen books reviewed as 5s on this very site that I would have rated as about a 3, and the reverse is also true.

      So for me personally, I need to have some way to evaluate whether I should take the chance on something that sounds like it might be good. I was unemployed for over a year and while I am working now and have money to spend again, I’m much more cautious about what I spend that money on. I want that book to be good enough to read several times over…and if it’s not I want it to at least be long enough to be mildly entertaining for a few hours.

      • …

        

        Wave Reply March 5, 2011 at 12:16 pm

        Hi Megan

        unfortunately with e-books we have no way of knowing exactly what we’re getting quality-wise until we’ve paid for it and read it!

        Word count is one one criterion. Quality of the writing is always the No. 1 consideration. I know that Dreamspinner posts the first chapters of their books so you can at least get a sense of the writing. I’m sure there are other publishers who do this but I personally am not aware of them off the top of my head.

        I was unemployed for over a year and while I am working now and have money to spend again, I’m much more cautious about what I spend that money on. I want that book to be good enough to read several times over…

        I don’t think there is a realistic appreciation by publishers about what this new economy has done to people’s entertainment dollars (if they have any.) One of the reasons that the “free” books on this site and the Christmas Eve giveaway are so popular is because not many people have a lot of disposable income. I very much appreciate the publishers and authors who provide the books for readers to bid on because at least occasionally they get something for nothing.

        The problem with ebooks is that there’s no return if a book disappoints so the more information readers get before they buy the better.

        If you have a Kindle and a book is offered in this format Amazon provides a free chapter so that you can figure out whether you want to buy. Hope this helps.

        Thanks again for commenting.

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      Wave Reply March 5, 2011 at 10:15 am

      Hi Enny
      I think I said in the post that the length of the book has nothing to do with what’s between the covers. I got my ass kicked a bit in a previous post which was about the lack of imagination in M/M writing, but the tide changed with authors and readers who actually agreed with what I said.
      Long and short it all comes down to quality writing.

      This post is not about price but maybe indirectly it is since we want to know if we’re getting a novel when we pay for one. Mainly the article is asking publishers to be transparent and include the word count of their books on their websites. They already have this information so they don’t have to search for it.

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    Mary Reply March 5, 2011 at 1:02 am

    Great post! At Pink Petal Books we do like to provide free first chapters at the end of a book. However all our word counts provided are for the story only. For example, I’ve had some comments about a short story we have for $1.89. The word count (7000 words) is listed, which is for the story only. We do provide the first chapters of several related books in the back, but those aren’t included in the word count or the consideration for pricing.

    Like others here, I have my own personal price points for what I’d pay (and as an author, I know I’ve looked at some of my stories and was like “they’re charging WHAT???”) so that’s what I keep in mind when it comes to pricing at Pink Petal Books.

    Great discussion!

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      Wave Reply March 5, 2011 at 11:03 am

      Hi Mary
      Thanks for stopping by and joining in the discussion.

      I was on your site this morning but I could not find the individual word counts of the books you sell (unless I’m not looking in the right place )

      The problem with the additional advertising material in some books is that it’s almost 1/3 of the actual book size so this material soon fills up a Kindle or other ereader.

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    eva Reply March 5, 2011 at 3:33 am

    I haven’t read the comments, so if I’m repeating stuff that’s been said, sorry.
    Great post Wave. And thanks for giving links to Kassa’s posts on the subject.
    First off, I find it interesting how the word count for a novel varies between publishers. Come one, up to 30K difference? That’s a whole new novel for those who set a low word count.
    Second, pricing the damn things depending on the popularity of the author is plain wrong. Don’t get me wrong, there are authors out there who are consistent in the quality of their work, and for those authors I could maybe, possibly accept such pricing standards. But lats face it, there are a lot more authors who aren’t. Moreover there are some who publish several books a month and are considered popular but the quality of their work and the editing is seriously questionable. So in the end having to pay more because of the name on the cover amounts to stealing from customers.
    Another thing is what Amber Allure’s representative said about having to have a cut-off point somewhere. Yes, I get that I really do and if I want the book I’ll buy it, but sometimes you can’t help but feeling slighted when you pay so much more for only a few more words. Plus, sometimes I get the feeling that there are authors out there who “specialize” in writing novels on the borderline word count. Call me crazy, but if you write for a publisher who sets the bar for a novel at say 35K words and every single novel you publish with them is up to say a maximum of 37K then IMO, something’s not right with that picture.
    In the end I’d just like to say that while quantity doesn’t equal quality at the same time money doesn’t grow on trees and I like to get my moneys’ worth in both quality and quantity. Call me selfish but that’s how I feel.

    • 39.1

      

      eva Reply March 5, 2011 at 3:47 am

      Just adding something I forgot to mention
      The biggest issue I have is that a lot of the publishers don’t give word counts, plus a lot of them don’t even give you any information on how they categorize their books according to word count and how that corresponds to their prices which means we’re buying blind. That’s something I don’t like and would love to see fixed.

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    Blaine D. Arden Reply March 5, 2011 at 8:53 am

    An interesting discussion on a subject I haven’t consciously thought about.

    Up to now I’ve bought books that seemed interesting, mostly regardless of the price/length ratio, though I have to think twice about some of the higher priced books or series (it took me weeks to decide to buy all of the Petit Morts series in one go, because I couldn’t buy just one … if I start reading I need them all. I’m greedy that way), but that has to do with affordability, not price/length ratio.
    I’ve had a couple of hits and misses, but that hasn’t made be become more critical. (of course I’m lousy at comparing prices doing my groceries as well, so that doesn’t mean much)

    As for the contents of ebooks: Despite the non-colour screen, I love a good cover, I don’t want to read the blurb in the beginning of the book, I don’t care about an index or a list of writers in the publisher’s stable and I start reading at page one and stop at ‘the end’, so anything after that goes unread (though I might skim author info if I haven’t read the author before).

    My only comment on pricing: Over here, most mainstream ebooks cost the same as their print version, so most prices in this niche only make me happy to buy
    I buy too many books at the moment, even if I borrow from friends as well, I think I buy about a book a week … that’s much more than I ever bought in print …

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    Treva Harte Reply March 5, 2011 at 9:08 am

    http://www.loose-id.com/faq.aspx

    It’s on Loose Id’s site.

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      Wave Reply March 5, 2011 at 10:44 am

      Hi Treva

      Thank you for coming by.

      It’s on your site but the word count is not on the individual books, which is what many readers want to know before they buy. I don’t know of many readers who search a publisher’s FAQs every time they buy a book and some readers probably couldn’t find the location. Listing the word count would also save reviewers a lot of extra work to try and locate this information for the purpose of their reviews.

      It seems like a fairly simple request since you have the information on word count for every book you publish and you provide it to third party re-sellers when the book is sent to them. Why not, as a customer service, include the word count at the same time as you list the different genres such as sci fi, paranormal, BDSM, fantasy, M/M, M/M/F, etc., multicultural etc?

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    Ingrid Reply March 5, 2011 at 9:12 am

    Cayendi, the prices in this niche market make me happy as a dutch buyer as well. So cheap compared to normal books available in NL.

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      Blaine D. Arden Reply March 5, 2011 at 9:34 am

      pure heaven

      Which is probably why I’ve bought so many books lately …

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    Tj Reply March 5, 2011 at 9:13 am

    Hi Wave – Very thought provoking post as usual. When I first started reading M/M, I would not buy short stories, thinking that they were not worth my time – which I believe was a carry over from my reading habits in mainstream fiction.

    Now after all these years, I’ve come to really appreciate the form. This has changed my feeling on a pricing structure for e-books somewhat too, as I am willing to pay for well written short stories, not solely based on length. Yes I fully agree that we should have some kind of industry standard for categorizing book lengths, and at least have that information when shopping for books. But I’d be okay with not knowing the exact word count or pages – since as many have said before – it’s not always apples to apples.

    But regardless of the book length, I do want to support not only the genre as a whole, but more importantly the authors who I enjoy. So if one of my favorite authors is writing shorter stories, I am happy to pay more than what the word count would dictate. After all I am getting the enjoyment of their skill as a writer, guaranteeing that the book will be well done.

    To me it’s like buying a brand name product vs. a generic – although all the same ingredients are there, it’s the quality of those ingredients and how they are mixed that makes the magic.

    I would also apply the same logic to novels as well, within reason of course. I want the genre to flourish and most importantly the authors who are putting out quality work to be able to continue to so. Like Buda, I own both e-book and print copies of some of my favorite author’s books.

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      Wave Reply March 5, 2011 at 10:36 am

      Hi Tj
      What you said makes absolutely great sense.

      I said in the post that the length of the book is no indication of the quality between the covers. However, readers have to start somewhere and when we buy a book that is sold as a novel we would like to know the basis on which it’s classified as a novel. So far it seems that word count is the only measure the use because we have all said that page count is meaningless. So give us that information along with the theme or genre (sci fi, fantasy, mystery, BDSM etc.)

      I would pay a lot more for books by my favourite authors, regardless of length, because I know that the quality would be there so money is not the issue …. except when I hit the ceiling of $10 for an ebook. Then I usually think twice or 3 times before hitting the “buy” button because I have to decide whether I should go for print or ebook.

      I definitely agree with you and Buda that Josh’s books are under-priced for what we get, but that’s a personal opinion as I’m sure that not everyone is a fan.

      In order for this subgenre to thrive I expect to pay more for quality books but I never know about the quality for an unknown writer until I open the covers. At least by knowing a few things about the book, length being one of them, the author being another, I can make an informed decision before I buy.

      You, more than many others, know how much I love ‘shorts’ and medium length books for many reasons. I would willingly pay for a much shorter book by one of my favourite authors much faster than I would pay the same price for a 70K book by someone I don’t know. I just want the publishers to give me the basis on which they categorize their books.

      This is very long comment to say that I agree with you TJ. We have to stop meeting like this.

      On another topic, don’t you just love Christian’s green balls? lol

      • …

        

        Tj Reply March 5, 2011 at 3:39 pm

        “On another topic, don’t you just love Christian’s green balls? lol”

        I’ve noticed quite a few cool enhancements that Christian has whipped up. Very nice stuff, but I’ve never heard of green balls, only blue ones!

        • …

          

          Wave Reply March 5, 2011 at 6:02 pm

          I’ll tell him to change the colour. That’ll give me an excuse to talk about blue balls. Maybe I need a post about that since Buda is too damn lazy and hasn’t completed his weighing assignment. :

          • …

            

            admin Reply March 5, 2011 at 6:21 pm

            Sorry you two, my balls only come in green
            

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    Jules Jones Reply March 5, 2011 at 10:36 am

    Random thoughts from reading the chunk of thread that appeared overnight UK time:

    Fashions in book length have changed over time, partly as tastes changed and partly from direct commercial pressures. Look at sf from the 70s and earlier and you’ll find a lot of novels in the 40-60 kword bracket, but you can’t sell a manuscript of that length to a mainstream treeware publisher these days unless you’re writing for the YA market or you’re in the bestseller list. On the other hand, the length of fantasy novels crept ever upwards for a couple of decades, partly as a result of many fantasy readers thinking longer was better value for money, until there was an abrupt reversal a few years ago when the book chains said they wouldn’t take anything with a spine greater than a certain width, dictated by wanting to put (IIRC) 4 copies rather than 3 in each pocket of a display stand for commercial reasons. One of my friends over in mainstream publishing had a new fantasy novel literally about to go to press when this happened, and was told by his unhappy editor that he would please turn it into two novels in a series, and by yesterday evening if possible. So that 40k lower cutoff for a novel in the categories of writing organisations comes from when it was an accurate reflection of the market.

    Josh is right about the amount of dialogue making a difference, but simple pdf page count doesn’t cut it unless you have an industry standard pdf layout and use that for the page count. There actually was such a thing back in the days of the typewriter, and it’s still used in mainstream publishing. It also uses a standard word length of 6 characters, because the goal was to allow an editor to estimate how many pages a manuscript would require in the finished treeware book or magazine. There’s a brief article on the sfwa site about word count.

    I use the standard mansucript format from the days of the typewriter as my stylesheet in my word processor, because it’s still the best way for many writers, including me, to keep mental track of How Much Manuscript. One inch margins, 12 point Courier, double-spaced. This gives about 250 words per page using the 6 characters method, and if I’m submitting something to a market that wants submissions on paper, I can print it directly without fiddling with it. And many editors prefer it even for electronic submissions. It’s also much, much easier for me to self-edit, whether on paper or on screen, because one of the reasons for this layout is to leave room for editorial annotations. That format would make a good basis for pdf comparisons, because it was expressly designed for that purpose and has been around a long time, but rather you than me on persuading publishers to adopt it for reporting their official page counts.

    If you think it’s harder to fiddle page counts on paper, I should introduce you to some paper books in my library. I actually mentioned this at the end of my LibraryThing review of Gents – 25 kwords spread over 172 pages by the artful use of large margins and typeface.

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    Jaime Samms Reply March 5, 2011 at 6:37 pm

    I voted ‘No” for all your poll questions, but I thought I would clarify. If I’m buying a book, it’s usually because I love the author already, and any word count is a good word count, so I don’t really care if I can afford the book, it doesn’t matter how long it is.

    Now. If I’m reviewing the book for the review site I work for, I will pay attention to word count because I’m slow and I don’t want to hold up books in review when the author is waiting for us to get that review out. So I chose shorter books.

    • 45.1

      

      Wave Reply March 6, 2011 at 1:52 pm

      Jaime
      I think you misunderstood the purpose of the post. It has nothing to do with whether a reader wants to read a short book – I love them and buy lots of them. The issue is that some publishers refuse to disclose the word count of a book as if it were a big trade secret.

      The matter of disclosure comes in because some customers feel ‘stiffed’ when they pay ‘novel’ price for a book and find out too late that it’s about half the size of what most publishers categorize as a novel. With word count listed upfront there is no doubt about the length of the book.

      When we review a book we provide the word count information where it is available because we know that the majority of readers want it (as you can see from the responses to the post). It’s great to be able to afford to buy whatever you want, but many readers afre not in that situation and they want to be able to spend their entertainment dollars where they feel they can get the maximum benefit. In this economy that’s even more critical as more and more people have to stretch their budgets.

      There are many new M/M authors (and you are a new M/M author I believe), who haven’t had a chance to build a fan base, and while readers want to buy their books they may hesitate initially because they don’t know what they are getting in terms of book length.

      As I said in the post, length doesn’t determine the quality between the covers, but it’s definitely one criterion that goes into the decision of whether or not to buy. The other criteria are less substantive.

      Thanks for commenting.

46. 46

    

    kiracee Reply March 5, 2011 at 8:18 pm

    I pay attention to word counts when they are available and would like to see them everywhere. I prefer longer fiction and, yeah, I have felt cheated on occasion when I bought a book that was much shorter than I anticipated.

    Authors deserve to get paid a decent wage – writing is hard work! And publishers deserve to get paid also. But I have to say it really frosts my feathers when a publisher wants me to pay $7.99 for an ebook and I can get a paperback for the same price that is twice the length. I find it difficult to believe that it costs more to produce an ebook than it does to print a paperback. It sure looks like greed from here.

47. 47

    

    Linda Reply March 6, 2011 at 12:04 am

    I’m so sorry there’s any misconception about Samhain’s pricing or editing practices. As an editor with Samhain Publishing, I can assure you that all our books go through a thorough editing process. Also, our pricing policy is available here: http://www.samhainpublishing.com/about-ebooks/
    Books over 90,000 words are always welcome. As was stated both here and in our submissions guidelines, we’ll consider books up to 120,000 words.
    I hope that clears up any misunderstandings.

    • 47.1

      

      Wave Reply March 6, 2011 at 5:15 pm

      Hi Linda
      I think Ally mentioend this earlier but I’m very happy you confirmed Samhain’s policy for the reader who commented. Thank you for dropping by.
      

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    Reggie Reply March 6, 2011 at 12:23 am

    The more I consider this post the more puzzled I get. U.S. businesses should be used to labeling their merchandise.We have labels for hot coffee-it might burn you.Labels exits on wine and coffee- might have ingredients harmful to you or unborn children. I was in San Fran for work and noticed Calorie listings on the main menu at Starbucks!
    So, labeling disclosures are common place, why is this a shock to USA publishers that readers are happier with full, easy access disclosures? This is the second post in a month asking for more labeling on ebook listings.Sure, this is the paying customer asking for labels vs a government regulation, but wouldn’t a business be more responsive to customers’ requests?
    Paint me confused…

    • 48.1

      

      Wave Reply March 6, 2011 at 1:36 pm

      Reggie
      I couldn’t agree more.

      If Starbucks can list calorie count why can’t publishers list word count? they already have the information. Surely from a customer service perspective trhey would want to provide this information.

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    Luce Reply March 6, 2011 at 6:03 pm

    This is a really interesting post, Wave.

    I *always* look at the word count. With the combination of only so much free time (after work and sleeping and running errands) + such a HUGE market + only so much disposable $$$, I decided that my spending cap per book was $6.99 and I’ll rarely (if ever) buy anything less than a 60k-word book.

    This means I’ll most probably be missing out on some wonderful (shorter) works, but I can’t quite justify spending upwards $4 for a 10k “novella”.

    For the record, I tend to buy most of my ebooks over at ARe and have yet to have had any problems in regards to the word count thing since they do display it.

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