Bestselling books have been getting shorter • Hacker News Board

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#81

Post by Archipelagia » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 8:36 PM UTC

LordDragonfang wrote: post #65

elmomle wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many of the longer novels in classic literature were originally serialized, and only later compiled into the lengthy tomes we know today.

Slightly related, but I'm a fan of web serialized fiction (fanfics, but also original works like Worm, Worth the Candle, Mother of Learning, Unsong, etc), and when I occasionally order paper copies I'm always astounded at just how physically large they are, in a way that doesn't come across in a purely digital format. I should note that this rebuts the idea that long-form fiction is disappearing, it's just not gettin…

Btw, got any interesting book recommendations? (And yeah, I already know about r/rational ;))

Seems like we both got very similar book tastes. And to recepriociate, I think you might enjoy: - Pretty much everything by Ted Chiang, but especially Understand - Asimov's Nightfall - Greg Egan's Reasons to be happy

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#82

Post by klodolph » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 8:37 PM UTC

stocknoob wrote: post #74

klodolph wrote: post #57

IMO most popular non-fiction books don't have enough content to justify their length. I'm not saying that the content is bad, or you shouldn't buy the book. The book is just padded out so you feel better about buying it. Who would buy a 40-page book for $15? The book gets padded out to 200 pages by repeating itself, adding filler sections, anecdotes, graphic design choices, etc. I am happy to see books get shorter if…

It’s amusing that people pay for page count and not the outcome. With travel, you pay more for faster shipping. Why not for transporting a good idea into your head?

People like content. More content is correlated with longer page counts. Longer page counts are correlated with higher retail prices. Someone said "I want to make more money" and the result was a set of incentives to pad out books with more pages of filler.

Consumers have no reliable way of telling how much actual content is in a book. They only know the page count.

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#83

Post by hombre_fatal » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 8:37 PM UTC

stocknoob wrote: post #74

klodolph wrote: post #57

IMO most popular non-fiction books don't have enough content to justify their length. I'm not saying that the content is bad, or you shouldn't buy the book. The book is just padded out so you feel better about buying it. Who would buy a 40-page book for $15? The book gets padded out to 200 pages by repeating itself, adding filler sections, anecdotes, graphic design choices, etc. I am happy to see books get shorter if…

It’s amusing that people pay for page count and not the outcome. With travel, you pay more for faster shipping. Why not for transporting a good idea into your head?

Not so fast. I’d wager that repetitive padding is more effective at getting ideas into your brain for the same reason you don’t retain as much material from SparkNotes. There’s less exposure and time spent with the ideas in the shorter work.

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#84

Post by yamtaddle » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 8:43 PM UTC

systems_glitch wrote: post #26

I feel like the page size in mass market paperbacks has also increased in size since high school/college. Perhaps it's just that I'm buying less-cheap prints?

The "trade" paperback size seems to have largely taken over from mass-market. Not completely, but there are definitely a lot more that size on the shelf than there used to be. Except in some genres, like romance, a section of which you can spot from a mile away because of all the short, uniform, mass-market volumes—but I think even there a lot of newer material's coming out in trade, and maybe hardback, and never seems to get a mass market format release. Especially true for the material marketed at the younger end of romance readers.

I expect interest in carrying books around is lower now. Pack it for vacation, maybe take it to the coffee shop or park, but how many of us still value a portable volume you can keep on you all the time, every day, just in case you have a moment to read? Phones fill that role, and then some, now. When you get ahold of one of those slim mid-century mass-market-size sci-fi paperbacks, and happen to be wearing a blazer or other jacket, you quickly discover why that length + size combo was so successful for popular fiction. It fits neatly in an outer jacket hip pocket, and hardly even messes up the drape of the fabric. Perfect for the 1940-1950s fella on-the-go. Can't do that with a trade paperback, nor with monster 400+ page Stephen-King-esque mass market volumes. A trim 200-280 pages in mass-market format is just the thing.

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#85

Post by moolcool » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 8:46 PM UTC

klodolph wrote: post #57

IMO most popular non-fiction books don't have enough content to justify their length. I'm not saying that the content is bad, or you shouldn't buy the book. The book is just padded out so you feel better about buying it. Who would buy a 40-page book for $15? The book gets padded out to 200 pages by repeating itself, adding filler sections, anecdotes, graphic design choices, etc. I am happy to see books get shorter if…

Oh man, it's SUCH a problem with non-fiction. Books like Atomic Habits and Deep Work are great, but both feel like they could easily be about half as long.

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#86

Post by ngoilapites » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 9:01 PM UTC

trgn wrote: post #53

ngoilapites wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Good writing is often concise" is flawed logic when relating to long books, except for myopic planners.

Reminds me of this joke https://www.reddit.com/r/writers/comments/x4427j/todays_writ...

You don't get it, and you won't until you learn to enjoy literature at scale, that is reading authors by their complete works.

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#87

Post by AlbertCory » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 9:14 PM UTC

klodolph wrote: post #57

IMO most popular non-fiction books don't have enough content to justify their length. I'm not saying that the content is bad, or you shouldn't buy the book. The book is just padded out so you feel better about buying it. Who would buy a 40-page book for $15? The book gets padded out to 200 pages by repeating itself, adding filler sections, anecdotes, graphic design choices, etc. I am happy to see books get shorter if…

Actually, since I'm sorta on the producer end of that market:

Word count is much more often what people in the biz focus on. It eliminates all the talk about margins, leading, font, paper thickness, etc.

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#88

Post by bluedino » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 9:17 PM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #64

klodolph wrote: post #57

IMO most popular non-fiction books don't have enough content to justify their length. I'm not saying that the content is bad, or you shouldn't buy the book. The book is just padded out so you feel better about buying it. Who would buy a 40-page book for $15? The book gets padded out to 200 pages by repeating itself, adding filler sections, anecdotes, graphic design choices, etc. I am happy to see books get shorter if…

Many books are padded by: 1. using thicker paper 2. using a larger font 4. more spaces between lines 5. larger margins 6. a bunch of blank and/or pointless pages at the beginning 7. ad pages at the end I see it all the time. A book's contents can vary 2:1 in length compared to another one of the same physical size.

This going to sound silly but I hated reading the Pragmatic Programmer series of books because of the font and the size.

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#89

Post by mitchdoogle » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 9:18 PM UTC

klodolph wrote: post #57

IMO most popular non-fiction books don't have enough content to justify their length. I'm not saying that the content is bad, or you shouldn't buy the book. The book is just padded out so you feel better about buying it. Who would buy a 40-page book for $15? The book gets padded out to 200 pages by repeating itself, adding filler sections, anecdotes, graphic design choices, etc. I am happy to see books get shorter if…

If you are correct, then the decrease in page length could just be the result of more people using ebooks, where the physical size of the book is of no consequence.

Re: Bestselling books have been getting shorter

#90

Post by cafard » Fri, Dec 16, 2022, 9:28 PM UTC

throwayyy479087 wrote: post #60

cafard wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A look at the Pulitzer Prize for fiction suggests to me that production has been uneven for a long time

Things being unfair in the past does not justify them being unfair in the future

I didn't have fairness in mind at all. I just think that we tend to remember the past for its successes and not for its mediocrities, so I hesitate to say that we are certainly at a low point.