# The Thirty-Nine Steps

The Thirty-Nine Steps by John Buchan has 41,003 words.

## At a glance

- **Author:** [John Buchan](https://musael.com/books/authors/john-buchan.md) (1875–1940)
- **Genre:** thriller
- **Readers:** adult

## How long it takes to read

- **Words:** 41,003
- **Reading time:** 2 h 44 min (at 250 words a minute)
- **Listening time:** 4 h 25 min (audiobook pace, 155 words a minute)

| Reading speed | Whole book | At 30 minutes a day |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 200 wpm | 3 h 25 min | 7 days |
| 250 wpm | 2 h 44 min | 6 days |
| 300 wpm | 2 h 17 min | 5 days |

## Read or listen

The Thirty-Nine Steps is in the public domain: these editions are free to download, read and share.

- Standard Ebooks: https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/john-buchan/the-thirty-nine-steps
- Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/558

## Counted from the text

Automated estimates from the selected Project Gutenberg text; it may include a preface or notes.

- Words in the text: 41,109
- Chapters: 10
- Dialogue: 23% of the words are inside quotation marks
- Average sentence: 15.6 words

## Where the numbers come from

The word count comes from the sources below.

- https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/john-buchan/the-thirty-nine-steps (word count)
- https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/558 (word count)
- https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q2609365
- https://openlibrary.org/works/OL76524W
- https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/558

Checked on 2026-10-27. Page counts change from edition to edition.

Source: https://musael.com/books/the-thirty-nine-steps