Basically I'm pretty much an amateur at writing seriously. I've been trying to find out what makes a good novel- technique and style and all the rest- but something I came across made me really stop. It was on a different website (writersworkshop.co.uk) and it was about how long a novel should be. The author of the article, who was herself a published fantasy author, suggested at least 90,000 to 20,000 words. In a different article, another published author spoke about the "one-third slump"- getting to 30,000 words and losing inspiration.
Actually, I've got a number of questions, and they are (sorry):
1- How many words do you think should be in a single chapter, approximately;
2- How many chapters do you think there should be in a novel, minimum;
3- How many words in a novel, also minimum;
4- How do you not run out of creativity/inspiration/ideas/energy/sanity?
Thanks :)
1. I think writing generally falls into natural chapters. If your beta readers then deem the chapters too long or short you can join them or split them further, but I don't think it is something you should worry about too much to begin with.
2. The minimum number of chapters is one.
3. If your ms falls below 50,000 words, maybe it's a novella or pocket novel. Don't mourn the loss of something that never was. Celebrate the thing you have achieved instead.
4. I think sanity is overrated. Only mentally stable people run out of ideas.
It also depends on whether your novel is a children's novel. A novel for children aged between 10 and twelve can be as little as 30000 words.
There's no real answer to the word count question - a novel's as long as it is. Anything you see 'recommended' are simply guidelines, which tend to be 70-90k (general fiction and crime) 90-100k (HF and Fantasy, 60-80k (romance), 50-70k (YA). Or similar.
On the other stuff, I'll tell you what I do to write an historical novel.
Basically, I write an outline and aim for 100k words total, basing that on
(i) 30 Chapters, which will probably get added to or reduced as I go along depending on where natural breaks seem to work best) of
(ii) 3000 words (10 pages) each, which will probably vary as I go along, again depending on where natural breaks seem to work best.
Those are a very rough guide (because they total 90k), but they work for me. As examples, my first novel (113k words) ended up at 37 chapters and the second (112k words) at 44 chapters.
Some publisher-produced series by different authors (light romances, westerns etc) have to be written with specific word counts to meet a brief, but they're unusual.
And you do run short on sanity. Just make notes on the other things as you think of them so you can go back to them when you get stuck.
Best of luck :)