I confess I’m spooked about writing short stories. Probably in the same way short story writers get spooked by novels! When a story idea pops into my head, it’s big – long-term, complicated plots, slow and gradual character growth, epic settings and twists. Short stories are … well, shorter.
Short stories have distinct advantages over novels and can also provide more streams of income. They can be sold individually or bundled as a collection. Some established indie authors claim that short stories are becoming more popular simply because of their length. Indie authors can also use short stories to give away, offering a taste of their style for a new reader. So even a diehard novelist like myself sees a number of merits to short story writing.
The following two strategies list some different approaches you can take to writing short stories:
Complement Your Novel Writing
I think of myself as a novelist, so using short stories to complement my fiction writing is the best strategy for me. I want to have shorter works available as giveaways, teasers and ‘dabblers’ for new readers. So, my short story strategy will involve writing a small number of them per year for the following purposes:
- Supplement my novel income between novels
- Provide a breather when working on lengthier projects
- Give away free on this website and other places
- Bundle with novels as a buy one-get one free deal
Short Story as Sole Source of Income
Are you better at writing short stories than novels? Than writing short stories as your one and only source of fiction income is a great strategy. Don’t let the smaller prices for short stories deter you from thinking they can add up to a lot of money. If you wrote and published a 99 cent short story every Saturday on Kindle and Smashwords, you would have 52 stories at the end of each year, plus at least four or five story collections. It’s potentially lucrative! To pursue this strategy, a sample list of goals for you would include the following:
- Finish and format one short story a week
- Offer short stories individually for sale at 99 cents
- Bundle short stories together into larger collections for $2.99
- Give some away for free to entice new readers
- Try different short story lengths, from 500 word flash fiction up to 50-page longer works
One Common Goal
No matter which strategy, the common goal for fiction indie publishing is to earn money. It’s up to you how you pursue it. I’m going to try writing some shorter 5-10 page stories alongside my novels, so you will see them appear on this website from time to time. One of my big goals for 2012 is to try different sources of writing income, and that includes short stories.
Now that you’ve read about using short stories as part of an overall indie publishing strategy, how would you incorporate short stories into your writing goals?
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
This is interesting, because I’ve just set this as my goal for this year. I’ve written two short stories already, the first one the one and only contest I have ever entered (sponsored by Harper Collins!), the other is an addendum to my first novel. It’s a ghost story, but I’ve not published it outside of my blog yet. But I just this month decided to do one a month for this year. The problem is…thinking up ideas. So one came to me the other night and I began it…only it’s turned into a novella. I’m going to try to keep it under 20K words (more like 15K, really). Like you, I like complex plots with characters you spend a long time getting to know. But it’s good practice for tightening plots and learning to be more economical with words. And I hope it will bring some attention to my longer novels. We’ll see what happens.
Hi Val-Rae, that sounds great. Yes, I get BIG ideas, but there are merits to writing shorter stories. Maybe we could think in terms of chapters? Like, instead of it being a short story, we could say, “Oh, I’m just writing a chapter from a nonexistent novel.” That may help the ideas flow better, for you and for me, too. It’s a great all-around goal, since it brings in more income and allows readers to sample your work before committing to longer works. Good luck, and let me know when you offer them.