Three-volume novel

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The three-volume novel (three-decker) was a major stage in the development of the modern Western novel as a form, being a standard form of publishing for British fiction during the nineteenth century.

It does not correspond closely to what would now be a trilogy of novels. In a time when books were relatively expensive to print and bind, publishing longer works of fiction had a particular relationship to a reading public who borrowed books from commercial circulating libraries. That is, a novel divided into three parts could create a demand (Part I whetting an appetite for Parts II and III); the income from Part I could pay for the printing costs of the later parts; and the librarian had three volumes earning their keep, rather than one. The particular style of mid-Victorian fiction, of a complicated plot reaching resolution by distribution of marriage partners and property in the final pages, was well adapted to the form.

The price in the United Kingdom of each volume of a three-volume novel remained stable at half a guinea, i.e. 10s 6d, for much of the century; which in purchasing power terms would be close to a high-quality hardback book today costing over £20. The business model of Charles Edward Mudie, the most prominent London subscription library proprietor, was based on this continuing high retail price, on novels he was able to buy for stock at 5/- per volume.

The normal three-volume novel was around 900 pages in total at 150–200,000 words; the median length was 168,000 words, in 45 chapters. It was common for novelists to have contracts specifying a set number of pages to be filled and required to produce extra copy if they ran under, or to be encouraged to break the text up into more chapters — as each new chapter heading would fill up a page.

Around two thirds of novels first published in book form (not already serialised in magazines) were released as three-volume sets; reprints of successful three-volume novels were often done in cheap one-volume editions.