My last 2 short stories ended up being rather high on word and page count. And my last play went double than was required. Usually I can stay on word count...but lately I have been wanting to take my stories further Now I have a new idea, that has bugged me for about three days. So this would be the time I would start getting ready with research, outlining, character development, determining the plot and so on...to see if I can pull it off I just have this feeling that this project, like my last projects, is going to lead me to staggering page and word counts- too long for a short story. I feel like novel writing is for the "big boys". So I am intimidated by thinking that I would go into the novel world. Compared to most people I am pretty new at this. I am fresh out of two college creative writing classes, so I must be too inexperienced to take on a project of this size. Should I just hold off on the idea that is bugging me, and attempt some short stories or focus on my bad poetry? How do you know if you are ready for a novel?
You don't need to be an experienced writer, or even a "trained" writer, to produce a wonderful novel. If you want to do it, go for it; and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
My brother started writing when he was eight, and he's been turning out multiple pages a day, every day, ever since. He started out terrible, of course, but last he timed himself, he wrote thirty amazing pages in two hours. (He's 16 now.) He just practices a lot, and really loves writing. Don't be deterred by lack of practice or experience. Don't let anyone hold you back or tell you what you can do. If you really care about writing, the story, and every word that goes into it, you'll succeed. I know you will.
It's not just about word count. An overly wordy short story is not a novel. How complex is the story you're looking to tell? How complex are the characters? Do you have some ideas for sub-plots? If the answers are "very", "rather" and "yes", then go for it. Best of luck.
your brother sounds like me same age and evreything that being said i still suck really bad anyways your reddy when you get the idea when your reedy to pub;lish it is a whole another thing but finish it before you worry about that
you'll know you're ready for a novel when you have a story idea that will be suitable for a novel... but to save a lot of wasted time and energy, you shouldn't start till you can be sure you've honed your basic skills to the point where you'll be able to turn out marketable quality writing...
I only started writing last year - have one completed trying to sell YA novel, and three others at various stages of draft. Even if they are rubbish I cannot regret a single word, have had a total blast writing them. It is so much fun, so exciting etc.
When you have an idea that is worthy of novel length. Don't just use a short story concept and spoil the original spirit with padding to bump up a short story to a novel for the sake of doing it.
It is not that I get overly wordy or use too much fluff. I stick with my outline, but then something new pops into my head so I type it up and it works. Or, I think in some cases I pick a subject too big for a short story..
I started off with a novel without even thinking about writing short storeis. I guess, well, novel writing helps me with continuation of writing a story rather than just working on one scene. I used to write short stories when I was little, but I guess I found it to be a little boring and I felt that starting writing novels is better and probably helped me improve my writing a little bit.
When you feel your ready and when you've got a plot big enough to fit a novel. I tried writing a novel at 10, I done pretty well actually but it was still crap, back then I was doing it for fun (still am) and I think that's what comes first. I think all I can do is write novels, I have too many ideas for short stories xD
Thing is I don't think writing short stories really prepares you for a novel anyway - I find them two completely different disciplines with different skills and expectations.
I'm writing a novel(a) and that's what I started with. I'm on 12000 words now. Since starting that I've written a bunch of short stories (about 5) and honestly the exercise is completely different in my (small amount of) experience. I enjoy both but for different reasons, the short stories allow me to work on snappy, catchy scenes, a quick but lasting impact, whereas the novel(a) is more about flowing narrative and character development.
