Writing a novel using MS Word?

Question

I am curretly working on a novel using MS word for my input. I have over 11,000 words so far and was wondering how that would translate into book pages. Is there a formula that you can use to determine the length of a novel by the number of words used (rough estimation, not exact) so I can edit as necessary?

Yes, Jerry...I am. Why do you ask?

Knight, that is an amazing idea! Thank you. I honestly would never have put that together on my own. I am more of a word person than a math person! I really appreciate it!

Answer 1

If you are writing in Courier, size 12, double spaced, with 1.25" margins all around, you're producing 25 lines of 60 characters, the "magical" 250 words (a "word" being any 6 characters, just like in typing/keyboarding class) per full page.

How this compares to the number of words on the page of a published novel depends on a lot of factors, the main ones being page size and font.

The number of words in a novel varies widely. Writers with proven sales records are allowed to run long, unknowns urged to write short. Genre also matters. At 100,000 words, the average published fantasy by an unknown author is far longer than the average first mystery at 65,000, for example.

Continue writing to the end for now, then edit or rewrite to improve and to adhere to desired word count. Finishing it comes before shortening or lengthening.

Answer 2

If there is, I've never heard of it. But I do have a thought that might work. Pick up both a typical sized hardcover and a typical sized paperback. By typical sized I'm not refering to the number of pages, but rather the width and length of the pages themselves. Since the pages of a hardcover are typically larger than those of a paperback, they will tend to have more words per page. Do not pick up a large print book unless you intend to have your novel printed as such.

Now pick a page in both, not one that starts a chapter or ends a chapter, you want one filled with plenty of words. A lot of books I've run into Have a bit of space on the page that starts a new chapter and pages that end a chapter may not always be filled. This is why you need to make sure the page is filled with plenty of words to the story. Take and count the number of words for each type of book, taking note of the dimensions of the page for that type (ie, the lenght and width).

Now print out a page of your novel that would corespond to the pages you just got the word count off. By corresponds I mean that the page would not be the first or last page of a chapter. I believe the typical sheet of printer paper is 8.5" x 11", but you may wish to make sure what it's length and width are. Now count the number of words on the sheet and compare to the number on the hardcover and paperback you checked out.

You may be able to use this to figure out how many pages you're looking at for your novel already.

Answer 3

The industry standard is 250 words per page. An average novel (full size) has aout 90000 or more words. So there you go. that makes on an average 360 pages, a little more or less.
If you have 11,000 words that is about 44 pages of a standard book.

TW K

Answer 4

http://www.writersservices.com/wps/p_word_count.htm
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