Nevertheless, the number of 600+ word books has been on an approximately downward trajectory for decades. There has always been considerable variation. * Rarely have more than one quarter of published picture books fallen within the 400–600-word range. * There has, though, been a clear dropping of word lengths since the 1990s (though only to levels common in the 1970s and 80s). The genre, as we know it today, become properly bedded in after World War II. * The average length of a picture book since the 1950s has not changed hugely, varying only between 513–643 words on average in the last 70 years. (Note: I excluded outliers – wordless books, board books and texts over 2,000 words). The samples aren’t large and I may have made errors – but the results, I think, are interesting nevertheless. Things ain’t what they use to be… or are they?īut has there actually been a significant falling off of word counts? I did a piece of (not particularly scientific) research using the word counts I could find for some of the most enduring picture books from the 1920s to today. It’s easier to trim words down in a text than put more in, so my advice would be to write what you want to write and an editor can always help edit down if necessary. Laura recommends aiming for 550-600 words, and not exceeding 750. Picture books have become a real collectable adult purchase. …to sharpen up narrative and language to create a more immediate tone and delivery of story, especially since humour and wit are playing quite a key role now in picture books.Īnother reason is there has arguably been more of an emphasis on the artistry of picture books in recent years and an increased desire to make the pictures do much more of the work. She puts the trend down to a desire from publishers, The Pirates are Coming! written by John Condon and illustrated by Matt HuntĮditor Laura Roberts (who has worked for Bloomsbury, Macmillan and Egmont) feels that picture book texts have got shorter over the past few years. Between 500 and 660 words (which all of my current stories now are) feels very comfortable for me. Lots of people talk about 500 words, but I actually don't remember my agent or any of the editors I have worked with putting that specific limitation on word count. Now that he’s learning to read, he’s aware I’m doing it, so I will have to resort to hiding the high word count books each night.īut he feels that, as a writer, he has a reasonable amount of freedom: I end up skipping bits in the hope my son doesn't notice.
Picture book author John Condon (whose The Pirates Are Coming! was recently published by Nosy Crow) does admit to occasional underhand tactics at the end of a long day. From personal experience, when my children were young, they were never content with less than ten or so minutes of reading at bedtime – if a story was really short, they’d always demand another! Sometimes it is argued that parents want shorter stories these days because they are so busy, but I’ve yet to see any convincing research to show this. Most publishers, though, don’t specify maximum word lengths for picture book texts – Penny Morris, Associate Publisher of Macmillan Children’s, for example, told me that it depends entirely on the individual story and how many words it ‘needs’. Most agree on a 400-600-word target, with 500 words the ‘sweet spot’. Scour the internet and you’ll find a lot of suggestions from writers about ideal word counts.
It made me wonder what average text lengths of picture books published today actually are, and if this has changed from the past. Obviously, literary economy is key to writing a killer picture book, but it seemed unhelpfully restrictive to writers that the upper limit was so low. Sorted.īut, the more I researched, and the more people I spoke to, the more it became clear that texts of this length are not what most publishers are looking for. Most of my early texts were between 700 and 1,100 words. This was great! It surely meant that I could do what so much of the advice seemed to recommend – make your story as long as it needs to be. Looking at the classic books on my shelf, I saw a huge variation in length, from Rosie’s Walk’s ultra-economical 32 words to the extravagance of The Cat in the Hat’s 1,621 words.
One of the first questions he asked was, ‘How long should my stories be?’
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