Over at Bookfox I found this link to an interview with short story writer Robin Black where she talks about the lack of stories about older women. http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_golden_girl_image Personally, I enjoy writing stories about older women. You have access to so much backstory and historical moments that have made this character who she is. Of course, all characters have a back story but when you can toss in the moral codes, the church beliefs, things that were expected of women in the past, you're looking at a very rich character.
David Cranmer asked a very interesting question on his blog the other day. How long do you like your short stories? He had as varied a response to his question as there are readers. http://davidcranmer.blogspot.com/2010/05/short-story-length.html I think Scott Parker pretty much nailed it, though, a story needs to be as long or as short as necessary because every story unfolds in different ways. Of course, as writers, we have word count restraints unless we choose to look for a different market than the one we're targeting. As an online reader, I prefer stories no more than 2000 words for two reasons. One, I find it difficult to read online at some of the sites - white print on black page is the worst. And two, I have too many interruptions through the day and its pretty hard to stick a bookmark between the pages and come back later and pick up where I left off, or sometimes even to remember where I was. With print stories, I love how a story can be "filled out" and explored on a larger scale and still be kept under 10,000 words.
Brian Lindunmuth posts writing quotes over at Spinetingler on a regular basis. Yesterday's quote was from Adrian McKinty. "Coincidence has no place in twenty first century writing." That's just the first sentence of the quote for the rest http://www.spinetinglermag.com/2010/05/20/quote-for-the-day-16/
First off, I understand from a reader's point of view that just suddenly having a character stumble onto a clue is rather like cheating but...life is nothing but coincidence. Its not like all the clues to a real crime are laid out in a neat little row for someone to follow. That would be a happy coincidence and certainly make a policeman's life much easier. You'll have false leads or you'll be so sure of who did it that you'll collect only clues that make that person guilty, until some chance remark or lab test sets you off on another path. Our characters are human beings and all of life is chance and coincidence, to deny that aspect of humanity is to make our characters almost super-human.
And finally, Paul Brazill dropped me a note to say that the Radgepacket 5 anthology is open for submissions. http://bykerbooks.co.uk/Submissions.aspx There's also an online zine for Radgepacket. This is British based and wants British crime fiction. I don't believe this is a paying market as I didn't find mention of payment while clicking around the site.
6 comments:
"... its pretty hard to stick a bookmark between the pages" sums it up nicely. Folks have short attention spans, busy, et cetera and they don't feel like scrolling down for 4-6,000 words.
I find that my tastes in the length of short stories has broadened over the years, although I nowdays tend to get frustrated when things are too wordy.
Hi, no Radgepacket is non paying. By the way, I think they'd be open to sruff from outside the UK, you know.
When I'm reading, David, I like to get lost in the story and between the distractions and the scrolling nearly impossible online, so the shorter works better. Which makes grabbing the reader in that first sentence and paragraph even more important.
I get very frustrated reading novels, Charles, because I keep seeing where they could cut so much to make it a better story. I tossed Stephen King's Duma Key to the side because I got tired of reading the crash details over and over. Tell me about the crash, then get on with the story, please!
I didn't mean only British writers, just that the editor wanted British crime stories, Paul. Should have clarified setting, not writers. :)
white print on black page is the worst
I hate those, too. What I do on those sites is click edit>select all which turns the print black and makes the background dark grey. Much easier on the eyes
Thanks, dix! I'll have to give that a try. I've noticed that some sites actually have a button you can click on that changes it for you now.
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