Writing Short Stories: It’s All About the Length of Things

Summary

The provided text emphasizes the importance of brevity in short story writing, advocating for limited characters, settings, and conflicts to adhere to the genre's constraints.

Abstract

Writing short stories requires a concise approach where the narrative elements such as characters, conflicts, and settings are deliberately limited to fit the compact form. The author acknowledges the challenge of adhering to these limitations, especially when it means cutting out clever but non-essential content. The article suggests that a single, simple plot with one conflict is ideal for a short story, allowing only the most crucial details to be included. The author reflects on their own struggle with brevity and invites readers to follow their journey in short story writing, offering the opportunity for feedback and engagement through social media and membership on the Medium platform.

Opinions

The author believes that size matters in short story writing, with smaller being better due to the limited scope of the genre.
Time constraints in short stories necessitate a focus on essential elements and a strict editing process.
The author admits to a personal weakness in knowing when to cut out superfluous content that doesn't serve the plot.
There is an acknowledgment that the standard rules of short story writing may feel constricting to new writers.
The author values reader feedback as a means to improve their short story writing skills.
The author encourages readers to explore their broader writing portfolio, suggesting a diversity of stories and essays.
The author promotes the use of social media (Twitter) to connect with readers and suggests a referral link for Medium membership.
An affiliate link is provided for a service that automatically posts stories on Twitter, indicating a potential useful tool for writers.

Short stories should have limited characters, settings, and problems. LESSON # 2

When it comes to the art of writing short stories, size matters, but in this case, it’s better when the size of things is smaller, not bigger. Your characters, conflicts and settings should all be limited.

Time is a luxury you don’t have in a short story, so that means being aware of your limitations, with regard to being able to flesh things out. That means paying attention to the length of things. This is a standard rule.

Writing short stories only allow you to include the most essential points.

You should remember to have:

A single and simple plot with no twists and only one conflict.

Some new readers may be concerned and feel that this standard short story writing rule sounds too constricting. You may feel like it ties your hands, creatively speaking. I can relate, because one of my own writing weaknesses is not knowing when to cut things short.

Sometimes we can write a passage that’s so cute or clever, that when it comes time to edit things out, we hate to cut it out, even if it serves no real purpose other than being cute or clever.

Taking the short story writing course has taught me to start learning how to leave out anything that doesn’t effectively help advance the plot of my short story.

So when you write your stories, or think of creative plots, characters and scenes; figure out how to make things interesting, and keep things simple at the same time.

I invite you to follow the progress of my own short stories that I decide to publish here on the Medium website. I’m hoping to get a lot of practice with my short story writing abilities, and all of you can help by providing your feedback whenever you read one.

I’d love to hear your COMMENTS on how you think I’ve done when it comes to applying the things I’ve learned.

DEAR READER: Thanks for visiting and feel free to browse through my writing portfolio. I have tons of diverse stories (article-style and personal essays) that you can enjoy.

Let’s be friends on TWITTER: @GoodeWriter

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