So I have this story in my mind. It's been there, I've thought about it and all. But I don't know how to consider it. I mean, it's impossible to create the entire story into one part. Just impossible. No, no, no. No. But it's not going to be long. Maximum around 5-6k (or MAX 8-9 if I get an epiphany about what I will do in the middle of the thing) words and that ain't too much really. But it will have chapters and it will have a bigger span in time, and all that stuff. What should I do with this? Should I consider it a short story with chapters or a small mini-version of a novelette? I know it's not important to the story itself, but it bugs me. Sorry if this is in the wrong section.
You can have parts in short stories, there's nothing wrong with that. If its max 9k, its still too short to be a novella (its not even a particularly long short story by the standards of a lot of published work I've read).
I've read plenty multipart short stories. Sometimes the parts are separated with blank space. Like that. . . And now we're into a different character perspective, time, location, or whatever. Sometimes a break is indicated by a few asterisks + white space. * * * Pick your preference. . . and don't stress it; just write it.
7k words isn't much at all, maybe around 20 pages depending on text and formatting. Adding chapters into something that small would make for very small chapters. I have about 10k words done on something I'm writing, its about 16 pages single spaced and so far only 2 chapters of the planned 40 and I personally think they are very small. You can consider you stuff short stories, a novel would probably run at around 50-75k+ depending on genre, but if you think yours is too long to be a short story, split it in half and make it a duology
You must treat it like a seed for which you do not know what plant it will become. It may become a rose, it may become a hedge, it may become a mighty sprawling oak tree. Just let it grow. A rose and a hedge and an oak are all beautiful in their own way, but you will damage any of them irreparably if you try to make one into the other.
Thanks, that has been helpful, quite. I knew it was little, but unless somebody tells me something directly, I'm doomed to doubt. The replies have been really helpful.
if it's between 1100 words and 50,000 words, consider it a novella. (or is it over 50,000...? haaahaaaaa....summer makes my brain dumb... )
In my country writers forcibly stretch short stories to 30/40 pages to make them look like novels, especially before the national book fair in February. Novels bring money We say that the only thing that doesn't shrink in winter is novel hahaha... Well that's the scenario in my country only...
Something 6000 or so words is a short story. Short stories have sections, as indicated by Kas. There are markets for short stories, and depending on the quality of the story and the market, you could earn anywhere from nothing or a contributor copy up to 25+ cents per word. The short story market is no less competative than the novel market, and even getting what is considered by many organization as pro rates (5-6 cents per word) is difficult to do--but not impossible. My opinion is that if your story is 5-6000 words, it is what it is. Polish it, find a good market and submit it. Start another project. Good luck. Terry
even at the longest you envision, it'll still be in the middle of short story territory and nowhere near the novel border... since there's no such thing as a mini-novelette [a redundancy], there's no confusion here... it's a short story, period! how you structure it is up to you... as long as it makes sense to do it in 'parts' or whatever, go ahead... there's no law agin it... there should be no blank spaces between paragraphs, in a ms... the standard mark to place in the center of line breaks is a single #...
Ah, that's good to know. I can only attest to what I've seen in published material. It seems like there's always more to learn about ms submission. Though this one does make sense, I guess. Blank space is wasted space. . .
It espacially makes sense when you consider that manuscripts are double spaced. Adding an extra blank line adds a lot of unneeded blank space to a manuscript page, particularly if you have several short paragraphs, as in dialogue. Paragraphs are therefore indicated by indenting the first line of a paragraph 0.5 inch or about one centimeter.
