Hi am in the process of writing a trilogy, aimed at teenagers, and I'd like your views on how long the books should be, and whether i need to alter the plots a bit to make them longer. I've practically finished the first book and it's come to around 60,000 words. the second book looks set to be around 85,000 words and the third should come to about 95,000 (I've only started my chapter plan for this book). I'm aware that this makes the first book pretty short for a novel. I can think of a couple of ideas to make it longer but these are not strictly necessary for the story and with a teen audience I know that I need to keep the pace up. What are your opinions? Is 60,000 enough? Thanks! Oh and I'm new so I hope this is the right place to put this
I know this isn't a very helpful answer, and certainly not the one you're looking for, but really a book should be as long as it needs to be. I.e. until you have covered everything that you want to in order to complete the story. If it turns out that 60,000 words raps up your plot, then that is the right amount.
YA books are typically between 60k and 80k so I think you're safe with your current word count. As for the other two, it's practically impossible to predict a book's word count until it's actually written.
you're within the acceptable range... but you'd better make sure your first book can stand alone, because if it doesn't sell well, your sequels won't go anywhere...
I think you should write it in however many words it takes you to tell the story. In all honesty though that probably doesn't help you... I think it depends on if you're marketing to young or older teenagers, the genre, etc.
