Simple Meals + Honest Book Reviews + Practical Living
Powering Through Doorstop Books
For one of my three book clubs, I pitched The Heart’s Invisible Furies by John Boyne. I had no idea it was nearly 600 pages long when I suggested it (LADIES I’M SORRY!). If you’re wondering, it turns out that it was a winner across the board! ANYWAY, a long book can seem overwhelming, I totally get that. And I know most people can be turned off by a doorstop book. Because let’s be real for a second, reading any book cover to cover is a time commitment. And anything over 400 pages is a serious time commitment.
Did you know the average book has 60,000 words? Which equates to roughly 240 pages. On average, it takes about 2 hours to read 100 pages — so give or take, you’re spending at least 4.5 hours, if not more, with a book. And that’s on the low side! Now take into consideration a doorstop book…
I personally consider anything over 400 pages in the doorstop category, while others would argue it’s anything over 350 pages. And some don’t even sweat until it hits 500 pages.
Once you’ve made a commitment to power through a doorstop book, here’s my single piece of advice to get you through:
set aside 30 minutes, everyday to chip away at your book, it’s as simple as that!
FAVORITE DOORSTOP BOOKS
The Longest Book I’ve Ever Read
A Little Life — 720 pages
North of 500 Pages
Pretty Girls by Karin Slaughter — 592 pages The Heart’s Invisible Furies by John Boyne — 590 pages The Kept Woman by Karin Slaughter– 560 pages All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr — 531 pages Middlesex by Jeff Eugenides — 529 pages The Good Daughter by Karin Slaughter — 528 pages Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld– 512 pages The Circle by Dave Eggers– 504 pages
Between 400-500 Pages
A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles — 462 pages Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty — 460 pages The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith (aka JK Rowling) — 455 pages The Help by Kathryn Stockett– 444 pages The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah — 440 pages Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King — 436 pages You by Caroline Kepnes — 424 pages Since We Fell by Dennis Lehane — 419 pages The Bitter Season by Tami Hoag– 412 pages
NOTE: although the true length of a book is it’s word count, page count is a reasonably good approximation since most books have a fairly consistent number of words per page.
