Word Caps and e-Publishing

Word Caps and e-Publishing
by Brenna Lyons

I’ve always said I’m lucky to be in e-publishing/indie press, where the publishers/editors are open to something “out of the box” plot-wise and character-wise, but I never realized how much further that luck stretched.

According to this blog by Colleen Lindsay (an accomplished agent with Fine Print Literary Management), a polling of the editors she regularly interacts with shows very definitive shift toward shorter novels in NY and very strict minimum and maximum word caps. Well, we always knew the latter was true, but the former is interesting, seeing as how the indie publishers I work with are split on the subject of whether long or short sells better.

Lindsay reports that anything below 50K in NY is considered a novella. Some indie publishers hold true to that, since the line for achieving print on formerly or concurrently e-published titles is often (but not universally) 50-55K.

What amuses me about this is that she further comments that something below 50K is something NY agents and editors never want to see, unless they’ve made a specific call for a “short story collection.” Beyond the fact that this confuses the issue of what a short story is vs. a novelette or novella, there are indie publishing companies that specialize in novellas and shorts. There are others that take everything down to 5K or so for stand-alone e-book release and may execute a print release of shorter works bundled together into print anthologies. There’s even one indie I can name that does both print and e releases on all lengths down to 5K.

As if that’s not confusing enough, I have to assume that Lindsay doesn’t deal with (or perhaps isn’t aware of?) NY lines like Harlequin Spice Briefs, which specifically targets e-book only releases of short stories. Even if agents aren’t on the bandwagon, e-publishing has opened NY to shorter works from a wider array of authors, via direct submission to the editors.

Indie press, especially e-publishing, is a godsend for both readers and authors.

Readers can find what they want to read…new and interesting stories, out of the box presentations, breakout subgenres that NY might later adopt (as they did with dark romance, erotic romance, erotica for and by women, the resurgence of paranormal romance in NY), and so forth).

Authors are given leeway not only in plotline and characterization, breakout subgenres and the continuation of genres or series that NY has discontinued (but that still have an audience, albeit often one too small for NY’s expected return)… Authors in e-publishing/indie press are allowed to break length molds held tight to in mainstream NY novel-length publishing.

My first “book” was a 214K serial novel. It took me three novels to get below 150K; the third was 145K. It took me six novels to get below 100K. It’s not that the books were grossly overwritten. I wrote the book that was. Sometimes that story will be 125K. Sometimes it will be 75K. Sometimes it will be a novella of 30K or a short story of 10K. Whatever it is, it’s good to know that e-publishing/indie press provides a place and audience for those works…even if the agents aren’t ready to embrace such a drastically different model, NY publishers on the wagon for it or not.

I suppose the good news is that most e-publishers/indie presses of my acquaintance don’t require agents to submit to them.

Happy submitting!
Brenna