Ridiculous Word Counts

I was recently discussing middle grade books (approx. ages 10-13+) with some literary agents, and discovered to my astonishment that many of them won’t accept a book if it’s over 60,000 words because they consider it unsellable. 

How short! I thought.  Personally, I feel cheated when a book is that short.  But more than that, I was confused.  In my experience, children will happily read a book that is absolutely massive – the longer the better, sometimes, for bragging rights.  Children will devour books.  They’re not like adults, who never seem to have time for that sort of thing (and other silliness).  What has gone so wrong with the publishing industry that they think this?  Moreover, what are they basing it on?  It can’t possibly be experience, because that makes no sense. 

When I think of internationally bestselling fantasy for middle grade readers—books by either first time authors or previously not widely recognized authors—I think:

Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by J.K. Rowling: 77,000 words.

Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy: 67,000 words
The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud: 122,000 words
Percy Jackson: the Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan: 87,000 words
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien: 95,000 words*

 /*I know it was written decades ago, but it’s still on Amazon’s top 10 bestselling children’s fantasy books/

At the moment, under Amazon’s “Children’s Fantasy and Magic Books” the top ten bestselling books (that I could find the word counts to – so not the Frozen movie tie-in books) have the following word counts:

101,182
101,564
95,022
129,312
43,617
129,725
89,124
132,818
83,432
90,942

 I’d categorize a couple of these as young adult, but most were middle-grade (including some of the longest ones), and the 43,617 I’d call juvenile.

 So . . . why again do agents not want middle-grade fantasies above 60,000 words? 

Stanford Prison Experiment Alive and Well in Reality TV

About a week ago, I returned from a two-week vacation in New Zealand.  Whilst there, I watched an episode of MasterChef: New Zealand.  The next day, I saw an episode of MasterChef: USA.  I had never seen either before.  The difference between the two was stunning and so enormous that I actually plan to watch one again often and plan to avoid the other like the plague.  The reason why?  For the answer, we can look to the Stanford Prison Experiment.

There are plenty of books to read on the experiment, if you’re interested, and it’s part of every major psychology text book.  You can also read about it here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment

In short: twenty-four male students were chosen at random to take part in the experiment.  Half of them were assigned to be prison guards, half were prison inmates.  All were normal people.  The point of the experiment was to see how fully and quickly the participants adapted and changed to fit their roles.  From the wiki article:

 “The participants adapted to their roles well beyond Zimbardo's expectations, as the guards enforced authoritarian measures and ultimately subjected some of the prisoners to psychological torture.  Many of the prisoners passively accepted psychological abuse and, at the request of the guards, readily harassed other prisoners who attempted to prevent it.  The experiment even affected Zimbardo himself, who, in his role as the superintendent, permitted the abuse to continue.”

In many ways, people tend to act how they’re treated as if they act.  And nowhere, for me, was this more clear than watching the two episodes of MasterChef. 

MasterChef New Zealand: the judges treat the contestants firmly but with respect and as adults with worth and skill.  In return, the contestants respect the judges and treat them as an adult student in a university would treat an admired professor.  They treat their fellow contestants with respect and friendship. 

MasterChef USA: the judges act like abusive parents, constantly belittling and publically humiliating the contestants and otherwise psychologically torturing them for fun.  In return, the contestants act like abused children, crying and apologizing and groveling cringing for the slightest mistake.  The very few who don’t grovel enough are further abused by the judges and given further hurtles to overcome when not outright and unfairly pushed out of the competition.  These contestants regularly scorn and backstab their fellow contestants and are constantly nasty and abusive. 

Is this what television thinks American audiences want?  I can hardly express how deeply ashamed I am to have Kiwis and the rest of the world think of us like that.