It’s common these days for editors and agents to discuss openly on Twitter what projects they’re looking for as well as what factors lead to acceptance or rejection. It’s so common, in fact, there are established hashtags (such as #querytip and #mswishlist) to track such comments.
However, editors’ and agents’ transparency sometimes leads to blowback from the writing and publishing community—like on Feb. 6, when Sourcebooks editor Mary Altman tweeted her position on word count. She said that adult fiction (for her needs, anyway) is between 80,000 and 120,000 words, and that 60,000 is “just too short to fit comfortably on the shelf.” Author Jeida K. Storey quote-tweeted Altman and wrote, “Some of my best reading experiences are with short books. Ever noticed how short Toni Morrison’s books are?” She added, “Ridiculous ‘rules’ like this keeps the books readers WANT and NEED from being published.” Thus began a social media pile-on that led to Altman protecting her account.
Much commentary has now been written on the matter, and our take matches that of Lincoln Michel, who said, “Ultimately, understand the market but don’t let it dictate you. And the better your book is, the less any of these rules of thumb matter.” Agent Kate McKean also has a helpful explainer about how word count affects publishers’ profitability.
Jane Friedman has spent her entire career working in the publishing industry, with a focus on business reporting and author education. Established in 2015, her newsletter The Bottom Line provides nuanced market intelligence to thousands of authors and industry professionals; in 2023, she was named Publishing Commentator of the Year by Digital Book World.
Jane’s expertise regularly features in major media outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, NPR, The Today Show, Wired, The Guardian, Fox News, and BBC. Her book, The Business of Being a Writer, Second Edition (The University of Chicago Press), is used as a classroom text by many writing and publishing degree programs. She reaches thousands through speaking engagements and workshops at diverse venues worldwide, including NYU’s Advanced Publishing Institute, Frankfurt Book Fair, and numerous MFA programs.
