Ok! I did it! I finished Chapter 15-whew! And I'm really concerned. I'm kind of having one of those moments when I'm both thrilled with what I came up with and have accomplished and freaking out about what it means.
Look at the details:
Chapter: 16
Word Count: 103,339
Page Count: 340
Why am I freaking out? Because I haven't gotten to the climax yet...and because I know how that goes down, I know it's going to take at least 100 pages...and I'm already nearly 340 pages in. This book is becoming very, very EPIC. And I'm worried that this is too long and I'm worried I won't be able to replicate this much intrigue and detail and plot, etc in the sequel and the third book and fourth and fifth (that I currently have planned!). (Yah I know I am way ahead of myself...)
But yikes, this is becoming long! I thought for sure I wouldn't have gone over 400 pages but now I think I'll be lucky to stay under 500.
So here are some epic YA fantasy book page counts to compare with.
1. Twilight: 498 Pages (this is comforting)
2. City of Bones: 485 Pages (also comforting
3. Graceling: 471 Pages (comforting)
4. Swoon: 421 Pages (much much less comforting)
5. Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone: 309 Pages (SO not comforting, abort! abort!)
6. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: 759 Pages (Whew! Right back in the comfort zone)
Alright I'm going to keep going. In the end I'm just going to tell the story the way I have to page numbers be damned, because really it's the story that matters, not the page count.
This part of the writing process always confused me - how do you reconcile between writing what you want and writing succinctly?
ReplyDeleteDo you just expect the thing to be edited later on or do you write it as if you're editing it as you go along? A little of both?
You know thats a really good question and not an easy one to answer, and I think it's worth a post over at the First Novels Club Blog...
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