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How long does it take to read David Balfour?

Robert Louis Stevenson

David Balfour by Robert Louis Stevenson takes about 6 hours 31 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.

About 6 hours 31 minutes

A weekend read

First published 1883. 355 pages, about 97,625 words. Written for children.

14 days at 30 minutes a day

Estimate based on 275 words per page.

At other speeds

Slow, 150 words a minute 10 hours 51 minutes
Average, 250 words a minute 6 hours 31 minutes
Fast, 400 words a minute 4 hours 4 minutes

The page count is the median across 280 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.

About the book

From the book:It is the fate of sequels to disappoint those who have waited for them; and my David, having been left to kick his heels for more than a lustre in the British Linen Company’s office, must expect his late re-appearance to be greeted with hoots, if not with missiles. Yet, when I remember the days of our explo-rations, I am not without hope. There should be left in our native city some seed of the elect; some long-egged, hot-headed youth must repeat to-day our dreams and wanderings of so many years ago; he will relish the pleasure, which should have been ours, to follow among named streets and numbered houses the country walks of David Balfour, to identify Dean, and Silvermills, and Broughton, and Hope Park, and Pilrig, and poor old Lochend - if it still be standing, and the Figgate Whins - if there be any of them left; or to push (on a long holiday) so far afield as Gillane or the Bass. So, perhaps, his eye shall be opened to behold the series of the generations, and he shall weigh with surprise his momentous and nugatory gift of life. You are still - as when first I saw, as when I last addressed you - in the venerable city which I must always think of as my home. And I have come so far; and the sights and thoughts of my youth pursue me; and I see like a vision the youth of my father, and of his father, and the whole stream of lives flowing down there far in the north, with the sound of laughter and tears, to cast me out in the end, as by a sudden freshet, on these ultimate islands. And I admire and bow my head before the romance of destiny.

Subjects: Adventure and adventurers, Fiction, History, Juvenile fiction, Fiction, historical, general, Fiction, action & adventure

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