How long should your novel be?

I struggle with this.

I naturally write short. I’m concise, what can I say? I can somehow create well-rounded, in-depth characters in very few words. I can show just enough of a room so that it can be imagined by the reader. It doesn’t take me long at all to show the action that needs to be shown.

I once followed the “rule”: Leave out the parts readers don’t read. Goodness only knows what that maybe, but I tried it and ended up with a 40,000 word novel (about 80 pages). I ended up having to rewrite most of the book putting those parts back in so that I would actually have a novel and not a novella.

When I published with a small publisher, they insisted that my books be no less than 80,000 words. I struggled to get there with each book I wrote for them. Finally, I just gave up and went back to publishing my own books so that I could decide how long a book should be.

But as I look toward the end of the book I’m writing and figure I’m going to be lucky to hit 60,000 words, that little voice in the back of my head is telling me that it needs to be longer. But does it?

I put the question to my friends on Facebook and got answers back from both writers and readers. A lot of people did say that they prefer longer books because they love prolonging their time with the characters. One clever friend…