Short Story Writing Rule 1: No Character Building
Within novels, the writer has whole chapters with which to provide their characters with depth and motivation, fears and ambitions. The short story is the reverse. In 3000 words, there is simply no time to spend 500 words on the protagonist's fear of snakes.
This isn't to say that characters can't be realistic and three-dimensional in a short story, but it is necessary for any depth to come from their actions and re-actions to the plot. In fiction, the character's actions are only part of their development: in a short story, they are everything.
Short Story Writing Rule 2: No Subplots
As with the character development, a short story's plot should be very lean. A novelist can have up to 200,000 words to play with, and as the renowned novelist Peter Robinson stated, can often be a constant search for more things to put in. Novels can also encapsulate a huge amalgamation of themes and ideas.
Short stories are one idea, and that is it: one simplistic, explosive and (hopefully) gripping plot. No real extra plots, or themes, or explorations on the barren nature of human morality, and certainly no extra bits about the antagonist's sick grandma. It could be seen as brutal editing, but short stories just do not have the space for anything extra.
Short Story Writing Rule 3: No Build-up
It is fairly tempting for any writer to give the plot a few hundred words to set the scene, but this is a mistake. It is very, very easy for scene-setting paragraphs to become more and more elaborate. It's all very well for a writer to spend 1,000 words describing a street, if they have 97,000 words of story to set there. When there are only 2,000 words to follow, though, the build-up will just make the story seem over-long.
If the short story is a woman interupting her wedding to declare her love for the groom, it would be possible for the writer to begin the story as she plucks up the courage outside the church door, or even as she bursts into the room itself. Either tactic could give a quick insight into whether the character is the nervous, scared type, or whether she is care-free and unafraid. The one thing the writer should not do, though, is to start the story with 700 words describing the woman's car journey down to the church. It adds literally nothing to the plot, and as with all fiction, if it doesn't help the story along, then it has to go.
It has it's own challenges, but in the end, short story writing can be as satisfying and as challenging as any other area of fiction writing.
For more articles and help on fiction writing, visit my other articles here.
Shaun Edwards - Shaun Edwards graduated from the University of Essex, UK with a BA in Creative Writing. SInce then he worked for a variety of different ...
Join the Conversation