Length

I know I've been rambling lately.  Probably because of a fairly large change in my life.  So for those of you interested in your work, let's have a reminder about dialogue.  Dialogue is not talking.  It's not conversation.  It seems like it is but it's not.  Keep it specific.  What is your character trying to convey?  Next, what are you trying to convey.  Can you say it in fewer words?

Why should you?

I honestly don't know.

I saw that HP Mallory's paranormal romances are over 100,000 words each.  In the past, only a book like Gone With The Wind was that long.  This is, to me, a very long book.  I'm surprised that with our much touted short attention spans, people actually rush to these books.  In order for me to read something that long, it would have to be beautifully written and realized.  Certainly with HP Mallory's success, many people think they are wonderful and I'll have to give it a whirl one of these days.

Are people actually reading all the words or are they just skimming to the "good parts".  Long ago I took out all the parts people, or I, would skim over.  I thought that was a public service.  Now we're into a Charles Dickens kind of mode where the more words you have the better.

If you have the sales, I suppose there's no reason to change anything.  If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

So in about 100 years we went from Robert Browning saying "A man's reach should exceed his grasp, or what's a heaven for?"  To "Git 'er dun!"