Quote:
Originally Posted by DNSB
One friend of mine was complaining that the last 3 books they read were shorter than 40,000 words making them novellas rather than novels. One of them was the third in a series where the first book had 60,000 words, the second had 49,000 and the third had 39.000. The trilogy is now complete so no 4th book to look forward to.
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There is most definitely a trend in some genres toward shorter. NO argument. The entire alternate-universe sci-fi/fantasy supernatural arena, that was first populated by the Anita Blakes and Harry Dresdens. Now those come out like popcorn from the popcorn machine, nearly 3-4-6 "novels" a year, all around ...oh, I'd say 40-45K words tops? They live and die on Kindle Unlimited where everybody seems to get hat they want. The readers get new short tales, and the author gets money, and KDP/Amazon gets traffic.
I admit I miss the longer reads! I remember at least a few occasions, in my life, when I was going thither and yon, or travelling or whatever and I literally bought books in the bookstore based on the sheer vastness of the spine! LOL.
Hitch