Q: How long does it take to write a novel?
A: However long it takes you.
A year. Six months. Twelve weeks. Ten days. Twenty-four hours.
It’s the same as asking how long is a piece of string. It all depends on where you cut it, right?
Writing a novel is a time-consuming exercise.
No matter what anyone tells you, you’re not going to have a novel ready for publication overnight. It just isn’t going to happen.
Sure it’s possible, 24 hours in a day and a writing pace of 2500 words per hour. You could get a draft.
But it’s not realistic nor probable.
There are prolific writers who churn out a book every 45 days (think Nora Roberts aka JD Robb).
Then there are those who might put one book every year or two (Patricia Cornwell, Lee Child).
There are indie authors who write several books a year (Mark Dawson, Bella Andre, Russell Blake).
And then there’s you.
How fast you write a novel comes down to how fast you write your novel.
There are a number of factors that you need to consider. Ask yourself the following questions and they will lead you to your answer.
How much time do you have to write each day?
How fast do you type?
Are you organised with your story?
Have you planned out your scenes?
If you’re aiming for an 80,000-word novel, you write 5 days per week, one hour a day, and 1500 words per hour, and you know your story and scenes, then you could have a novel written in about 10.6 weeks. So, just under 3 months.
I can average about 50 words per minute without too much strain. If I were to write at that pace continuously for one hour, I’d have 3000 words down on the page.
Unfortunately, that sort of pace and output is not realistic every day.
Sometimes one hour of writing can give me that 3000 words, whilst at other times it hovers around 500 words.
I write as fast as I can on my commute to work, and if I’m consistent then I can have a draft finished between 30-45 days.
A draft.
That’s not a finished novel.
After the draft is done you have to consider the different types of editing.
I think that the more books you write, the less editing you end up needing because you start mastering some skills, techniques, and tactics, making the writing process of a novel much smoother.
At the beginning your book might require the following:
- A structural edit
- A copy edit
- A line edit
- Proofreader
- Beta readers
By the time you finish writing your fifth book, you might only need the following:
- A copy edit
- Proofreader
- Beta readers
If you’re really super talented and awesome at self-editing you might get away with just a proofreader and some beta readers.
The fact is, writing a novel is hard work and it’s time-consuming. Just because there are thousands of books being released on Amazon on a weekly basis doesn’t mean that they were easy to write or have given all the editing options a chance.
Writing a novel is more than just about writing a novel. That’s just the beginning.
So even if you’re a speed demon when it comes to typing, it’ll take you four weeks to draft a novel.
- Allow another two weeks for self-editing.
- Another two weeks for an external edit if you’ve got your editor booked in.
- Another week to proofread the book.
- Potentially another two weeks or so to get beta readers feedback.
- A further week to make corrections and proofread.
Three months.
Do it every quarter and you can have four books out in a year.
Easy, right?
Maybe.
It all comes down to the type of quality product you want to produce and how much time you have to commit to writing the novel.
Let’s be honest, someone who has no kids, no job, and zero commitments, has much more time to commit to writing a novel than a single full-time-working mum with four kids under six.
I don’t think it matters how fast your write your novel. What matters is that you get it written.
One thing I have noticed in my own writing process is that I get much more written when I have less time. The difference is, is that I know that I have a limited amount of time and it’s the only time in the day that I can be done.
That means, my brain has been trained that come 6:05 am when I sit on the train, the muse is waiting for me to start putting words to the page.
Day in, day out like clockwork. The words get written.
- Lethal Disposal was written over several years.
- I finished writing Lethal Games in about six months with lots of breaks in between.
- Lethal Instincts took about six weeks to write.
- I drafted an upcoming standalone suspense-thriller in 30 days during NaNoWriMo back in 2008, stewed on the idea for several years, then rewrote it over the course of another 31 days in July.
As you can see, each book took a different amount of time to write. It all depended on the time I had carved out for my writing.
Did you read that last point?
I said, how much time I had carved out for my writing, rather than how much time I had available.
We all have a finite amount of time available to us. It’s how we choose to use it that reflects on what we are able to achieve during this time.
How important is writing a book to you?
If it’s a priority you will make the time for it regardless of your schedule.
As a working mum with a boisterous and cheeky three-year-old, and a dozen responsibilities, I know that if I don’t write on the commute to work, chances are I’m not going to write at all.
Maybe you’re not that lucky to spend an hour or so on the train morning and afternoon to write. That’s fine. Not everyone does.
How about spending 15 minutes writing whilst your kid naps?
What about using half of your lunch break to work on your book?
Maybe you’re an early bird and can wake up an hour earlier?
Night owl? Write when everyone is asleep and go to bed later.
Instead of partying every Friday night, spend a couple of hours working on the novel.
Jot down notes, dialogue, setting as you wait at the doctors, accountants, lawyers, office. Whatever.
It can be done.
You just need to to take responsibility for your time and prioritise.
If you want to write a book, you will, regardless of the amount of time it’s going to take you.
As Nike puts it, Just Do It.
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