The average novel is about 80,000 words, up to 90,000. Of course, some are longer, and others, not so much.
I only think of this because today is the birthday of Victor Hugo. He was born on February 26, 1802, in France.
He wrote the second-longest novel in all of history. Les Miserables was a whopping 545,925 words. Many of his novels were lengthy, such as The Hunchback of Notre Dame, at 152,490 words.
The longest book on record is War and Peace, written in 1869 by Leo Tolstoy. The word count for it is 587,287. Again, the average is 80,000.
The third longest is by J.R.R. Tolkien. The Lord of the Rings, written from 1954-55. It is 455,125 words long. I’m fairly certain this is the collective trilogy.
So. Old wordy Victor Hugo.
Some think long books are miserable. I try not to make them a Hobbit.
The Wordy Words. Miserable.
