Hello Readers,
I submitted my latest story to my writer’s group and got some feedback yesterday. It is always interesting when you receive differing opinions, but it makes it hard to work out which way to go with your writing sometimes. The submission was a fantasy/horror piece that started as a short story. I finished it some time ago and had been letting it sit after some previous feedback. The general consensus at that time was, they loved the concept, but it was more than a short story and I should continue writing it.
I picked it back up about a month or two ago and started to add to it. I have some new characters and I’ve built a bit more of a plot. I’ve also added more details around the concept and had to alter some of the previous content to align it with the changes. Anyway, after my latest submission there were a couple of people that really loved it and gave me glowing feedback. And then there were others who felt confused, said it needed to be clearer, and had questions on how the concept works. I’m not big on the details, as a writer I don’t think everything needs to be explained. I like to throw things out there and let my readers read between the lines, drawing their own conclusions. After all, I write fantasy and some things can’t be explained, they just are. But my dilemma is that some people thought I should leave it as a short story and others thought it could be a longer work. Now I’m wondering what to do. Do I leave it as a short story, publish now and move on to my next project, or do I carry on and turn it into a novella or a novel? I may just keep writing, send both versions to my Beta readers to see which they prefer, hoping there is a clear winner.
Happy Reading.
Allan Walsh writes Fantasy and Horror. If you’re looking for something new to read in these genres, why not check out his books here. You can also find his titles available in some libraries.
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The reason some people may be getting confused is this. Remember your classic short story is ‘one character, one day, one idea’ + a killer twist as the final line. If it is more than this it is no longer a short story. If you’ve added new characters and more plot ideas it’s growing into a long short or novelette. Many traditional sf authors published something as a short story then expanded it later and republished it (though the expanded version often didn’t work because it was really just a padded out short story!). An example. ‘Flowers for Algernon’ – Daniel Keyes, the story about the intelligent mouse worked well as a short. Keyes rewrote it as a short novel which got an award but when I read it I (personal opinion) found it tiresome. There may be other examples like this. Cheers.
Thanks for your comment Graham, I think you are right that some short stories just don’t work as longer works. I’m going to try to turn this one into something longer, who knows, it may become something great. But, if it doesn’t work for me, I will have no problem in taking it back to a short story 🙂