The other day I came across this blog post by Jim Hines http://www.jimchines.com/2010/01/killing-characters about killing off your characters. While most of the comments deal with novels and movies, it's still an interesting topic for short story writers. Killing off anyone but the bad guy seems like bad form for a short but Flannery O'Connor did an excellent job of making this work in "A Good Man is Hard to Find" http://notearama.blogspot.com/2010/01/good-man-is-hard-to-find.html And maybe that's an advantage short story writers have over novel writers, we actually have the option of killing off our protag without alienating our readers.
Over at Do Some Damage there's a great interview with short story writer Hilary Davidson. Yes, she writes other stuff but I still think of her as one of the best short story writers around. http://dosomedamage.blogspot.com/2010/01/interviewing-hilary-davidson-macgyver.html
I love reading about novel writers who struggle with the short form. There's some interesting thoughts in this blog post by Clare Langley-Hawthorne about her struggle with writing a short story. http://killzoneauthors.blogspot.com/2010/01/new-challenge.html
11 comments:
If you run across short story writers struggling with the long form, let me know. HELP!!
Count me in on that one, Patti. Maybe you have to come down with a case of diarrhea of the pen in order to write a novel. :)
I put a pretty big piece into my book Write With Fire on the killing characters topic. I believe it's absolutely important to kill at least one of your positive characters, especially in thrillers.
What I liked about the discussion was, yes, you can kill the characters, but make it count. The death needs to mean something to the other characters, not just be shock value for the readers.
In an interview with the science fiction magazine Odyssey Tim Powers once said the following:
“It takes almost as much hassle to write, to plot and research and outline a short story as for a novel, not quite but maybe half as much time. And, of course, a short story isn’t half as long as a novel and it doesn’t make half the money a novel makes. Also, most of my short stories tend to be either pointless vignettes in which I don’t bother to do the plotting. Or they are telescoped novels where people come to conclusions with way too little evidence, and the action happens too conveniently rapidly.”
That's the problem for novelists writing short, Brian, they over-think the process. A good short story writer could take the simple act of sitting down to drink a cup of coffee and turn it into a short without batting an eye. And in most any genre.
Just wanted to say thanks for mentioning the interview, and for your kind words about my work. Coming from you, Sandra, that is high praise indeed!
I almost think it takes a different sort of brain, Brian. One that sees the charm in a moment and all the rest as filler.
That Flan O' Conner was no slouch,eh?
No she wasn't, Paul. Her shorts are well worth tracking down.
I used to have Everything That Rises Must Converge about 20 years ago. Loved it.
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