How long are literary fiction novels?
13 famous literary fiction books, compared by word count and reading time.
109,211
Median length
113,249
Average length
29,160
Shortest
206,052
Longest
Publishing standards put literary fiction novels at 70,000–100,000 words, with a sweet spot around 80,000–90,000 words. The 13 published titles below have a median of 109,211 words — a real-world cross-check on that range.
Range source: Writer's Digest genre length guide; agent query guidelines from QueryTracker
Every literary fiction book, longest first
| Title | Author | Word count | Reading time |
|---|---|---|---|
| Moby-Dick | Herman Melville | 206,052 | 14 hr 26 min |
| Jane Eyre | Charlotte Brontë | 183,858 | 12 hr 53 min |
| The Grapes of Wrath | John Steinbeck | 169,481 | 11 hr 52 min |
| A Tale of Two Cities | Charles Dickens | 135,420 | 9 hr 29 min |
| Pride and Prejudice | Jane Austen | 122,189 | 8 hr 33 min |
| The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn | Mark Twain | 109,571 | 7 hr 40 min |
| Beloved | Toni Morrison | 109,211 | 7 hr 39 min |
| Wuthering Heights | Emily Brontë | 107,945 | 7 hr 34 min |
| To Kill a Mockingbird | Harper Lee | 100,388 | 7 hr 2 min |
| The Picture of Dorian Gray | Oscar Wilde | 78,462 | 5 hr 30 min |
| The Catcher in the Rye | J.D. Salinger | 73,404 | 5 hr 8 min |
| The Great Gatsby | F. Scott Fitzgerald | 47,094 | 3 hr 18 min |
| Of Mice and Men | John Steinbeck | 29,160 | 2 hr 3 min |