Professor Tom Ressencourt, in a recent article for the Literary
Review observed that the shorter novel is making a comeback. He said, "
Short
novels are for busy people, for the journey to work, for
the weekend, for the beach. They have no padding, no stuffing, no
unnecessary waffle to get the page count up to 500 –
just the story/the action/the characters/the dialogue. They are for the
modern age. They are for today's
reader. Frankly I couldn't care less what type of coffee the hero
prefers or what time he gets up in the morning. I want the story to
keep moving along. And there are plenty of examples of knock-out short
novels in the past."
Professor Ressencourt's list included:
The Great Gatsby
Animal Farm
Peter Pan
A Christmas
Carol
Frankenstein
Northanger Abbey
Fahrenheit 451
The Old Man and The
Sea
The Hound of the Baskervilles
The Big Sleep
Bonjour Tristesse
Heart of
Darkness. They are all short novels. About 200 pages.