Support for Indie Authors discussion

I have 3 e-books in my series, A Unique Planet, a sci-fi series. I want to put them together and publish a paperback. The e-books are short and combining them comes out to about 225 pages in my Word doc. Not sure how many pages that will be in a paperback.

Regardless, when I combine them, should I delineate each book? Give a title page and restart the chapter numbers? or should I put them together as one book? I'm not up to date on what is in the marketplace.

Any and all feedback is appreciated.

I'd combine as one book. It's short enough that each entry would serve as an act.

225 pages is a fairly short novel. Not sure why you separated it into a series in the first place. I'd combine it as one novel in paperback and e-book.

I agree with the previous comments. 225 pages is a short novel, especially for sci-fi.

I did a trilogy for a client a while ago (I format books) and it came to 881 pages in print. We decided that was too costly so did an Kindle trilogy version only. We had a title page for the trilogy. We did separate the books with their individual title page (without the author or publisher listed), that books' acknowledgments page and a dedication page - but no separate copyright page, just one at the beginning. And one About the Author at the end. Hope this helps.

225 8.5 x 11 pages, right? In that case, it will likely come out to around 400 pages in the 5 x 8 dimensions. How many words total is it?

Thanks Kevin, your information helps a lot. I tend to pack a lot into a few pages. People tell me my stories "really move". So, for me to write longer books, I would have to include a lot of filler and I don't like to read that sort of thing, ergo, I don't write that way.

The series has 12 books in all scheduled. As each book is finished, I release it on Kindle. When a group of three are finished, they will be published together in paperback. I know it's not the way anyone else does things, but then I never do anything the way others do it.

However, I may march to the beat of a different drummer, not dance to the notes of a different flute. I need to balance my uniqueness with standards in the marketplace. Thank you again, Kevin for helping me find my balance.

Yes, Phillip, you are correct, 8.5 x 11 pages. I checked and it's at just over 108k words. Thank you for the clarification.

C.J. wrote: "I tend to pack a lot into a few pages. People tell me my stories "really move". So, for me to write longer books, I would have to include a lot of filler and I don't like to read that sort of thing, ergo, I don't write that way."

It's not really a question of how you write or what your style is. What concerns me is who is going to pay for a series of short stories at two or three dollars a pop? Combining three short books into one would not mean your writing would stop moving. It would not mean you'd have to put in a lot of "filler". It comes down to how are the books selling?

C.J. wrote: "Yes, Phillip, you are correct, 8.5 x 11 pages. I checked and it's at just over 108k words. Thank you for the clarification."

Got it. My books range from 90,000 to 101,000. Each has been over 400 pages at 5 x 8. Mind you, dialogue and number of chapters will impact page length. However, with that many words, you should have a solid book in the 450 pages range (if combined).

I've formatted books since 2012 - you would think I would remember to ask about the page size and how many words like Phillip did! :-)

That's a reasonably sized book, not a small novel. Still, I suppose you might want to maintain each work's "separateness" and position it as a trilogy. Good luck.

it is a huge book have a trilogy. if not one book its fine.

225 pages on Word turns out to be very tiny.

When you reformat the text and pages for Amazon Kindle/Ebook, the final page count ends up becoming much smaller than expected.

My WIP book trilogy is currently at 191,000 words and near 450 pages on word. Even this big document can be split into two books instead of three (I still chose to make it into a trilogy, though).

I'd make it all into one book. I agree with the first two comments you received, At around 225 pages which is like one book it should serve as one book. You could perhaps consider writing more and expanding on it if you wish to separate it into a trilogy.

Instead of making it one big book, you can leave it separate books and then sell it as a box set which seems to be all the rage now. If you do put it in one book, then make sure the books are delineated. by saying Book One, Book Two, Book Three with the title of each book. If you keep them separate, at the end, you can do a large box set or keep it to three novels per box. If you are only using Amazon, then you aren't paying for ISBNs and it would work.

Good to know about the box set, B.A. I spend too much time writing and not enough time out in the world to know what's going on.
I have decided to publish as a trilogy and will be delineating the three separate books. I may however, use the box set idea for the next set of three, which I'm currently writing. Since books 4, 5, and 6 of the series are turning out much larger than I had originally expected, I was starting to wonder how I would handle such a large trilogy. Problem solved! Thank you!

One thing I have learned [the hard way :-( ] is that people appear to be quite willing to buy three books in a trilogy, but if a little less is put into one book, priced a little over on book in a trilogy, people moan that it is too long. Is there an explanation for this seeming aberrant behaviour?

Yes there is. People today what things in small bites and anything which seems long, they will pass up at it will take to long to read. If you keep it in smaller bites, like books of 200 pages, they will buy it. 600, not so much. It's all about perception.

Weird. They will buy 3 at maybe twice to three times the price and spend slightly more time. Yes, they could stop at book 1 in a trilogy, but they can stop anywhere they like otherwise. Still, it is what it is.

C.J. wrote: "I checked and it's at just over 108k words."

The standard shorthand for calculating the number of pages is 250 words per page. So 108k words would be about 432 pages total (manuscript only, not all the extraneous front and back material). That's not a long book for SF.

For example, Frank Herbert's Dune was 185,723 words (743 pages). It's always been published in paperback as one novel. That's a pretty big book. Yours is about 60% that size.

So, I'd say putting it in one book is best.

Internally I'd only separate the three shorter books if there is a plot or structural reason to do so. Do all the books have their own internal plot arc? Do they wrap up in what feels like an ending? Or do they just flow one to the other?

If each book is structurally or plot-wise a complete statement, then perhaps a demarcation of where one ends and the other begins is in order. However, if the three are all just one continuous stream of plot with no logical subdivision, just put it together as one book.

In the end it's really a matter of what you think is best. There is no standard as to how you format a trilogy into one book.

Look at it another way - anything under 80 k words is not considered a novel by most agents. Most novels an agent will consider lie around 100 k words. To go down to three of about 35k words might be considered by some as shortchanging.

Ian wrote: "Look at it another way - anything under 80 k words is not considered a novel by most agents. Most novels an agent will consider lie around 100 k words. To go down to three of about 35k words might ..."

Really it depends on the genre. The "official" answer I've seen is that a novel (regardless of genre) is 40,000 words long. This works for a comedy or romance, but sci-fi and fantasy readers will consider it far too short.

I thought 40,000 words was just a novella, but I guess we have to accept whatever we are told. Unless you are going for an agent, who cares?

Ian wrote: "I thought 40,000 words was just a novella, but I guess we have to accept whatever we are told."

Since I write only SF I follow the specifications that The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America use for its Nebula award categories ...

Novel 40,000 words or over
Novella 17,500 to 39,999 words
Novelette 7,500 to 17,499 words
Short story under 7,500 words

Editors in SF today may very well be looking for 100k or more because that seems to be the going expectation of readers, however that's not been the case historically.

There are so many classic novels of much shorter length.

Fight Club is just under 50k
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone is under 79k
H.G. Wells's Time Machine was only like 32k
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (first book) was only 46k
I, Robot ... 69k
Slaughterhouse-Five ... 52k
Fahrenheit 451 ... less than 51k

Micah wrote: "The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America use for its Nebula award categories ...

Novel 40,000 words or over
Novella 17,500 to 39,999 words
Novelette 7,500 to 17,499 words
Short story under 7,500 words."

This is the guidance I use.

OK, my source is outvoted. However, I still think breaking a 100k story into three had better have a good reason, with complete story arcs in each, or the readers will not be impressed.

Ian wrote: "...I still think breaking a 100k story into three had better have a good reason..."

Agreed. Even breaking it two would be suspect.

Well, granted, Roger Zelazny did publish The Chronicles of Amber in what, ten short books? But honestly, I thought even those were padded out with a lot of fluff.