Our fourth writers’ blog carnival (November 2025) is open for submissions. The theme for this month is “your writing strengths”. Last month’s (but still open and running in parallel) is Work in progress (Oct/Nov)

What are your writing strengths?

We all have aspects of our writing that we excel at (or feel like we do) and those that require more effort – struggle even.

What are your strengths as a writer? (Here are some aspects of writing, but I bet there are ones I have not even thought of.)

Why do you think you excel at your writing strength?

Is it due to practice, natural talent, life experiences, a good teacher, your writing group, or something else? What has life, chance, or dedication done to grant you this skill?

What current weaknesses are you trying to turn into strengths?

For me, editing is a whole new game. I don’t feel confident in my editing skills as I do in some other areas. I owe everything I have figured out to feedback from the Thanet Creative: Writers’ group. I get a lot out of being part of a writers’ group.

What is a weakness you are trying to turn into a strength?

I look forward to reading your posts

I’m excited to see what you all write. Remember to link to this post and ping us with your entry. This post may close for new pings sometime after the month is over (or not). As long as it is open, late submissions are welcome.

This post was first published on Author Buzz UK in 2024.

How many words should a novel have? That’s a question I’ve seen many times. Just recently, user Burty Burtman asked in the forums, “How long is a novel?“

The answer is that for novel word counts it depends. Any numbers you can get are, at best, rule-of-thumb with many exceptions.

To give you a better answer, I asked Google, “How long should my novel be by word count?” I asked follow-up questions for some genres. Below is a summary of what the Internet says about how long a novel should be. There was generally little consensus and so a lot of notes.

For the average, I took the mean of the upper and lower limits and then the mean of those two values.

I did NOT ask AI. As far as I know, all sources were written by humans.

Novel size for…	Word Count Range	Word Count Average	My Estimated Ideal (best guess)
Novels in general	70,000 to 120,000	85,000	70,000 to 90,000
Genre romance (13)	50,000 to 100,000	79,000	80,000 to 100,000
Genre romance: Harlequin/Mills and Boon	50,000 to 60,000	55,000	50,000 to 55,000 (1)
Women’s Fiction (13) (2)	70,000 to 110,000	85,833	80,000 to 100,000
Family Saga	100,000 to 250,000	156,250	100,000 to 125,00 (3)
Crime/Suspense/Thriller/Horror (13)	40,000–135,000	82,500	Horror: 40,000 to 50,000 (4) Otherwise: 55,000 to 90,000 (4)
Historical Fiction (13) (5)	75,000 to 180,000	97,000	75,000 to 100,000
Fantasy And Sci-fi (6) (7)	60,000 to 200,000	121,429	90,000 to 120,000 (8)
Literary Fiction (9) (5)	45,000 to 100,000	78,750	70,000 to 100,000 (8)
Memoir/Biography (10)	45,000 to 100,000	98,500	70,000 to 80,000
Young Adult Fiction (11)	30,000 to 90,000	62,334	60,000 to 70,000
Picture Books (12)	0 to 800	290	100 to 250 (8)
Self Help & How To (13)	30,000 to 120,000	60,000	40,000 to 70,000 (11)
Children’s (12) (13) (14)	200–3500	1300	300 to 3500 (8)
Short Story (14)	3,000 to 30,000	13,500	7,500 (8)

1. This genre is strictly defined by word count must be within 50k-55k
2. This genre was somewhat nebulously defined with fewer suggestions
3. If this is your first novel aim nearer 100k but if established 250k may be possible
4. Make every last word count – established writers may get away with longer novels
5. Not really a single genre
6. hard sci-fi may run as little as 60k
7. Genre Fantasy tends to run longer
8. Your Mileage May Vary
9. The shorter, the better it must be
10. Celebrity memoirs can be (much) larger
11. If you are really good and it is justified, higher word counts may be available
12. Varies by reading age
13. Varies by sub-genre/topic/niche
14. Varies greatly – do your homework first

Please share your thoughts, comments, questions, and examples that fall way outside the range in the comments.

I had a dyslexic moment and could not remember which weather I wanted. So I looked it up. Following the advice to “blog your homework”. Here’s the answer for next time I forget.

TL;DR: Whether or not the weather is good will decide if we go to see the wether.

Wether

Wether is a castrated goat or ram. It can also be part of a British place name. You probably don’t want this one.

Here’s a Wikipedia link if you want to know more.

Weather

Weather is the stuff that is falling out of the sky. Snow, rain, sunshine, clouds, gale force winds – these are all weather.

Here are some animals being unimpressed with the weather.

Whether

This is the speculative one. You use whether when there is doubt or choice. Whether or not you want to do this depends on what you are writing about.

Our first writers’ blog carnival is open for submissions. The theme for this month is “writing tools”.

Tools of the writing trade

This theme is inspired by a discussion we had at last night’s writers’ night about what tools we use to plan our writing. Sadly, we ran out of time to get into the topic, but I thought it made for a great jumping-off point for our new carnival that I invented this morning. (Blog carnivals are old; this one is brand new.)

For more on this carnival, see our carnival page.

Some questions to ponder in your reply posts.

Are you a Pantser or a Planner?

Do you plan your writing, or do you just write and see where it goes? Perhaps you are some hybrid of the two? What’s your planning vs inspiration style?

I’m a bit of both. It depends on the story.

What do you write with?

Many modern writers type directly, while others like the feel of pen and paper for their first drafts and type up later. What’s your approach to first drafts and initial writing?

Me? I like to use LibreOffice and type directly.

If you plan or track your story, what do you use?

I have heard a lot of talk about things like Scrivener, World Anvil, Fantasia Archive, Campfire, and Obsidian. Of those, I have only used Obsidian, which is a bit like a personal notes and wiki mashup that is surprisingly easy to use (and free).

My main tool for planning is my Word Processor, some folders, hyperlinks, and a master document. It works for me.

What writing, planning, or tracking tools do you use?

Can you recommend any tools (free or paid) other writers might like?

Would you care to share how you use your tools and/or how this helps your writing?

Where and when do you like to write?

For me, writing time is at my desk, in my living room, when it is quiet and there are no upcoming appointments to interrupt me. The middle of the night and/or early morning are best.

That’s me, though. When and where do you like to write?

Gathering and storing ideas

I’m probably not the only one who writes down their dreams, right? Dreams can be a great source of fresh ideas. I keep them on my computer. That said, lately, I have taken to publishing my dreams on one of my blogs.

Another fine source of ideas is things overheard on the bus. Trust me, you hear some wild stuff.

I know of one writer who loved to take photographs of interesting things. Those photos went on the wall as ideas for new stories.

Where do you gather your ideas, and where do you keep them?

I look forward to reading your posts

I’m excited to see what you all write. Remember to link to this post and ping us with your entry.

Edit: I know I originally said, “This post will close for new pings after the month is over.” I’m leaving it open for now. Come share when you are ready.

Yesterday at our writers’ night, a bit of an emergency developed. I want to thank everyone whose response no doubt made a big difference in the outcome. I won’t embarrass anyone by naming names, but I would like to sing your praises.

Two of our writers went above and beyond in caring for one of our writers’ group attendees yesterday evening. I was deeply impressed with their willingness to give up their time to look after another writer. I don’t feel like I should say too much about what happened for the sake of everyone’s privacy, but I cannot let the moment go unremarked altogether.

The kindness and thoughtfulness displayed yesterday will live with me for a long time to come. You are an example of the kind of world I want to live in. Thank you.

This conceptual gold star goes specifically to two of our writers’ group (you know who you are) but also to everyone who showed kindness and support through the events of the evening. I should also mention the staff at The Wheatsheaf, who are also deserving of praise. I hope Wheatsheaf management knows what wonderful staff they have – give them a raise if you can.

I am delighted that we have such big-hearted and level-headed members and supportive hosts. A big thank you to every person involved. The outlook is positive, and you are all stars.