How to Increase Your Word Count!

How to Increase Your Word Count

There are many ways to increase your word count in order to hit that magic number you are after! I personally would know because I have participated in the Accountability Challenge on the Mafia Lounge and other forums.

I wouldn’t call it “cheating” exactly, but let’s just call it the fluff enhancer that you can go in and edit out later when the book is finished.

• Contractions suck! At least, with word count they do. Instead of using “you’re” use “you are”, and instead of using “she’s” use “she is”.  Those words really do add up!
  

• The too much description method is a good one. As someone who writes in first person, I love going into detail about every little thing my character thinks, feels, sees, or says. It’s the kind of thing where you can make your character talk about a sandwich for a good 400-500 words. The funny thing is, the more you do this, the more you learn about your character. Your character becomes much more relatable even if you cut the fluff later.
  

• Background stories. You would not believe what a useful tool this is. This is a rough draft novel, and so ANYTHING goes! Did you suddenly out of nowhere decide that your antagonist hates pickles and that it’s because his sister soaked his pillow case in pickle juice, let it dry out and he slept on it, heard a loud sound, and bam, he’s actually afraid of pickles? That’s fine. How can you use that later in your story? Describe it, write it explore it!
  

• Have a character who repeats everything. We all have that friend who never pays attention and requires everything to be repeated. Or better yet, explained in ridiculous detail. Again, if it becomes excessive, you can ALWAYS edit it out later.
  

• The thesaurus is our friend, my fellow writers. How many words can you use to describe the same thing? How many different ways can you explain the way the sun looks? Why does this matter? Not only is it useful in foretelling, but reading the same words again and again can get boring, aggravating, and slightly monotonous. In fact some would say that it is lame, annoying, and dull. Perhaps other people would describe the task of using the same word over and over as a one trick pony, or a result of a lack of vocabulary. Plus, it just creates more words to go into crazy detail with too many adjectives versus too little.
  

• Sometimes the sheer amount of words you have to write each day will eat you alive. It digs into your soul, making you feel like you can NEVER complete it in time. Well that just isn’t true! If there’s a will there is a way. If you started this, you have the will, so just make it happen. If you know you have events coming up during the month of November and you won’t have time to write as much that day, make sure you write ahead. In other words, the more words you write a day, the less you have to worry about later. So, If you know that you have a weekend event coming up and you can’t write… Add an additional 500 or so words a day if you can up until that day. That way you don’t get behind. Get ahead while you have the spark and just don’t stop when you hit the word count for the day!
  

Feel free to post more word count posting suggestions down below. Every little thing helps!