I Want More

Because I took so long to write my last blog post I'm adding another in the same day. Whoo! I don't want this to be an outlet where I gripe about my lesser favorite types and styles of writing, so I am going to make this a more personal piece on why I write such long fiction.

First off, what is the difference between a Novel, Novella, and Short Story? For me it is the plot. A novel requires hundreds of pages and dozens of chapters to complete the plot. A novella less, maybe even no chapters, but the plot can be completed in less pages than a novel. Short Story is obviously the shortest then and as the name describes it is a very quick plot with little to unfold. Now these are debatable terms. For example larger novels can have a very simple plot, defend the kingdom, get the airship to another planet, or rescue a princess from a tower. The most distinguishing difference is a novel's plot can have tangents and meander from time to time. A novella can, but the tangent is more anecdotal, quicker, and plays a role in some way. Short Stories are very strict in their dedication to completing the plot.

Because of this I have a hard time writing short stories. My base for writing is to explore all situations and exhaust all scenarios to set up the reader in a way that allows for understanding of a scene and its characters. Because of this some scenes may appear repetitive or unneeded, but when looked at as a whole grains of story can be found and apply to later on in the plot or character development. I once had a professor say 'A novel has wiggle room to go off on a side quest,' or something to that extent. I took that to heart for my writing. A novel is a long look at someone's life while a short story is a quick glimpse. A novel has lulls just like if we were to explain to a friend about our day. Not every moment was full of exciting news. However if a friend asks us about a specific event we can play it up and add all the interesting notes of that one event and make it sound exciting. A loose example, but I think it works.

So why the big intro? Well there is another form of writing I am starting to see a lot of and it is short content fiction. These are normally books with a plot of a novel and the length of a novella, but some are as short as a short story. I urge authors away from this. My main reason is I think this stems from the traditional publishing industry forcing caps on word count for specific genres. If you have watched my YouTube channel, read other blog posts, or follow me on TikTok, I am not one for convention. I think a story is only as long as it should be regardless of what that word count is. These short content stories I think suffer from lack of depth.

Let's dive in a little further. If you're still with me let me say this is an opinion and to each is own. For me I feel cheated from these books at times when little about the world is described and me as the reader is required to guess things about the world that should be explained. While this is in a sense lazy reading I am referring to world building that I could not know unless I was the author. This also leads me sometimes to be confused if the rules of a world are not explained and contradictory events occur with no explanation other than a hand wave from the author because they do not want to spend the words to explain it in fear of going over an arbitrary limit.

Other times character growth, another big thing for me is undercut leaving odd decisions for the character in order to move the plot forward so it isn't 'bogged down.' I want to understand why a character made a choice. If that means I have to watch him carry a pale to a well and attempt to draw water from it only to find out it's empty and then learn a large or small trait of that character sign me up for that. It is a much more enjoyable experience when a reader can understand a character than simply being forced to accept that they made a choice because of some unknown thing that we didn't get to see.

As an Indie Author I find it relieving to write for myself. I don't write to a number of words or set limits on myself. I write for the story. Once I think it is complete I publish it myself. This doesn't mean I avoid editing or give myself unlimited control over what should remain in the story. I am not like Lucas with the prequal Star Wars. I do self edit and take criticism and have others read my work before publishing, but I do not worry about word counts because I know the story is complete.

I hope you enjoyed the post and I look forward to the next one.