Short versus Long

I had a conversation with a fellow writer recently about short stories versus novels. He wondered if people, because of the hectic pace of modern life, would be giving up reading novels in place of short stories. I thought no, that just the opposite would happen. People with busy lives would turn away from short stories. Neither of us have data to support our positions, so all of this is speculation.

I reasoned this way. The novel is the only art form that cannot be consumed in one sitting. Anyone starting a novel knows they will put it down at some point and pick it up later. Not so a short story. Yes, you can put the story down and pick it up later, but I think that most people commit themselves to finishing the story once they begin. People with fragmented lives and smaller chunks of time for reading might be reluctant to open a short story if the probability of finishing is small. A novel, on the other hand, can be consumed in sips. There is no time commitment to finishing a novel. One simply reads while one can and resumes later.

Writing a short story also takes a large commitment of time. I find that I will start a short story with the expectation of finishing it quickly. I usually won't begin a short story unless I have large blocks of time in which to write. Thus I think of short stories as vacation writing. Not because they are relaxing, but because I can tackle them without work or other commitments interfering. I write my novels on the other hand in the mornings before work and whenever I can steal time at my desk. I know the novel will be a long-term project, no matter how large or small the blocks of time for the project.

I find that, page for page, a short story takes more time and effort than a novel. The reason is that every word has to count. Writing tight is not easy. A case in point is a short story I began last year about this time. I wrote it during a six-week period in which I worked at my job only four days a week, so large blocks of time were free to write. Getting the first draft was easy, but then I had to edit it.

This particular short story is quite long. The first draft came in at 18,000 words, almost a novella. I had to cut it. After six drafts, I had it down to 12,000 words and I was pleased with the result. The story had good pacing, good character, good action, and tight writing. I queried an editor who expressed interest in the story. However, he wanted 10,000 words. If longer, he said, it had better be exceptional. I decided I would do both; I would shorten the story and I would make it exceptional. When you go from 18K to 12K, you get rid of most, if not all, of the fat. Trying to go from 12K to 10K, after all the fat has been cut away, is like polishing bone. After two weeks and two more drafts, I've manage to cut 600 out of the 2,000. Maybe I'll make it, but I suspect it will take me the rest of the summer.

What's your experience with short stories? Do you read them? Do you write them? Do you prefer them to novels?

Mark Troy
Hawaiian Eye Blog
Game Face from Ilium Books, on Kindle, Nook, and other ebook readers.

The two things about plot by Mark Troy

A writer named Glen Whitman wrote about the concept of the two things. The two things refers to the type of question that is often posed in a bar after a couple of drinks. "What are the two things everybody needs to know about X?" For every subject there are only two things that are really important. Everything else is an application of those two things or else not important.

I decided to try it with some aspects of writing. Here, in my opinion, are the two things a writer needs to know about plot.

1. Isolate the protagonist.

2. Grow the problem.

I recall seeing a fantasy poster once by the great calendar artist Frank Frazetta. In it a warrior woman, sword in hand, stands on a clump of rock, maybe the top of a mountain, surrounded by a more numerous, better-armed enemy.  The "ah ha" was when I realized I was looking at the climax of this woman's story. I don't recall the story or the character, but her future was clearly in doubt at that point. The print was a perfect metaphor for what takes place at the climax of a story, the peak of the action.

Isolate the protagonist.

The insight for me came when I asked, "How did she get there?" She didn't get up that morning with the idea of climbing a rock by herself and swinging a sword at an army of bad guys. She probably had family, friends, comrades-in-arms. Where were they? Why weren't they helping her? What made her go it alone? I don't think she wanted to go alone. Clearly some of our protagonists are loners, but it's not always by choice. When it comes to our own survival, most of us want some help and backup. Readers of police procedurals know that the call that gets cop cars rolling is "Officer needs assistance." This warrior may have sent such a call, but the assistance never arrived. Had help arrived, the story would not be as compelling.

Grow the problem.

How did these bad guys get there? How did they get to be so numerous? How did they get to be so well-armed? Our warrior must have royally pissed someone off. She probably didn't start the day that way. Like most of us, she had problems, but they would have been small ones. None of us want to take on more than we can handle. When things begin to get out of hand, we tend to back off. Obviously, our hero didn't. Her problem grew and she could not escape it.

Isolate the protagonist and grow the problem.

Both of these happen slowly and inexorably in the story. We know before we open the book where the hero will end up--alone and up to her neck in trouble. The hero could be FBI agent-in-training Clarice Starling, in a basement catacomb, in the dark, trying to save a young woman from a serial killer with a handgun and night-vision goggles. She started the day as the junior member of a team. Her job was to gather evidence. Along the way, she became isolated and her problem grew.

Even the quintessential loner heroes like Jack Reacher and John McClain don't start alone. Nor do they set out to fight terrorists in a skyscraper. On the other hand, when the story involves an ensemble such as the men and women of the Dan Kearney Agency, one of the group will end up alone in the final battle.

To get our hero to that peak of the action where he or she stands alone, we must build in events that increase our protagonist's isolation each step of the way and grow the problem, like Audrey the carnivorous plant, right before everybody's eyes. If we do that, the anticipation that something bad is going to happen will increase inexorably.

So, the two things about plotting are isolate the protagonist and grow the problem. Everything else is an application of those two things or else not important.

Mark Troy

Look for my collection of Val Lyon mystery stories, Game Face, on Kindle, Smashwords, and other ebook platforms or in paperback from Barnes and Noble or Amazon.

Source of Ideas by Mark Troy

This Friday is February 17. Mark it on your calendars. It is the day the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue comes out. It is already available for download on your iPad. It has already been downloaded on mine.

I'll be spending a lot of time going through it, as will many readers, not to ogle the bikinis (okay, I'll admit to a fair share of ogling) but to find story ideas.

My first mystery story that was accepted for publication, Wahine O Ka Hoe, was inspired by an article in an SI swimsuit issue. The article was about the women's Molokai to Oahu canoe race which takes place every year. It's an open ocean race across what is possibly the most dangerous channel in the world. (Mystery author Twist Phelan paddled in that race one year.)

What caught my attention in the article was a paragraph describing the dangers of the race. These fourteen hundred pound canoes are like sticks on that turbulent ocean. They surf down the face of ocean waves like runaway ore trains. There are six paddlers in a canoe and four relief paddlers in the escort boat. The most dangerous part of the race occurs when they change paddlers. The escort drops a paddler in the water and the canoe comes alongside. One paddler goes over the side and the other swings into the canoe. Because this is a race, the canoes don't come to a full stop. Moreover, they don't want the relief paddler to have to swim to the canoe so they try to come within arm's reach of the paddler in the water. Now imagine that the steersman misjudged the distance or that a sudden ocean swell came up behind the canoe. If hit by the canoe, that paddler in the water could be seriously injured or killed. That's what I imagined and wrote my story about it.

In another issue, I came across an article about the Purdue women's basketball team beating the women of Tennessee on their home court. The article was called Home Wreckers. I turned that into a short story of the same name.

In still another issue, though not the swimsuit issue, was a story about some highly prized but unsung athletes, the bulls of the professional bull-riding circuit. That article became my short story, Horns.

In recent years, to my chagrin, (I'm typing this with a straight face.) Sports Illustrated has dropped a lot of the articles in order to devote more pages to bikinis and body paint. But that doesn't mean there is no longer story inspiration to be found. The idea for my latest story, Ripper, practically leapt off the pages of one SI swimsuit pictorial, as did a work in progress of which I won't say anymore at this point.

Four published stories and one in progress is a pretty good showing. Sports Illustrated, for this writer anyway, is a great idea generator. That's why I'm excited about this Friday.

The four published stories appear in Game Face, which you can get free this month in ebook format. Click here to get an iPad, Nook, and Kobo version. Or click here to get a Kindle version. The download will begin as soon as you click on it. If you want a paperback copy and are in central Texas, visit me at the Madison County Writers Guild Book Sale and Signing on Saturday, Feb. 18 and Sunday, Feb 19. On Sunday, I will be giving a short story workshop.

So what inspires you?

Mark Troy
Hawaiian Eye Blog

Celebrate February

Let's celebrate February!

It's the shortest month of the year. It occurs in the dead of winter. Except for the Superbowl, the only sporting event of consequence is the publication of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue.

February has perhaps the weirdest collection of holidays of any month.

• On February 2, we have Ground Hog Day, where we honor a reclusive little burrowing mammal, which, on this day, takes on the status of oracle.  
• February 14, Valentine's Day, is the one day of the year that creates more anxiety for men than a group prostate exam. What's so hard about Valentine's Day? Finding the right gift. The right gift is one that gets you, the guy, what you want, which is to get laid. But can the gift say that? No. The gift must say the opposite. It must profess undying love and commitment. A gift that screams, "I want to jump your bones," will get you an evening alone. 
• Mardi Gras this year falls in February. What do we do on Mardi Gras? We engage in all sorts of excesses and debauchery in preparation for six weeks of atonement for excesses and debauchery. 
• Finally, there is President's Day, which is, in my opinion, an equal to July Fourth in importance because we celebrate all US presidents, and especially George Washington, the founder of our country, and Abraham Lincoln, the preserver of our country.

February birthdays are awesome. I don't think there is another month with an all-star birthday line-up to match February's.

Let's take just two dates.

• February 12 is the birthday of my granddaughter, Morgan, who is the cutest, smartest dancer in the world. It is also the birthday of two of the greatest thinkers of the world, two men of genius whose accomplishments are still being felt--Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln.
• February 22 is my birthday. Okay, maybe that's not much, but look who else was born on this day. George Washington, Edward M. Kennedy, Robert Baden Powell, Drew Barrymore and Edna St. Vincent Millay.

Pulitzer Prize winner Edna St. Vincent Millay penned what might be the best paean to excess and debauchery.

First Fig
My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But, ah, my foes, and oh, my friends--
It gives a lovely light!

A list of other notable February birthdays can be found here.


To celebrate February, I am giving away FREE electronic copies of my short story collection, Game Face. This offer expires at the end of the month, but, because this is a leap year, February has an extra day for you to take advantage of it.


To get your copy, click on your preferred ebook format:
mobi (for Kindle)
epub (for all other e-readers)

Mark Troy
Hawaiian-eye Blog
http://www.marktroy.net

2011 My Year in Writing

2011 began on a low note for me.  In January, my agent cut me loose. It wasn't that he had lost enthusiasm for my book. He hadn't, he said.  What he'd lost was the ability to sell fiction in today's publishing world. It was a theme I heard repeated later in the year.

Needing an agent, I rewrote my query letter and synopsis. Then I did another revision of the book—the eighteenth draft. In February, I began a new search for an agent. If my previous agent showed his uncertainty about the publishing world by getting out of fiction, other agents are showing it by taking fewer risks with new authors. So far, 57 queries have netted me eight requests for partials and one request for the full manuscript. One agent, after telling my how much she liked what she'd read and after requesting more of the book, decided to get out of fiction. That makes number two. I'm not taking it personal.

I attended two conventions, Killer Nashville and Bouchercon. At Nashville, I learned more about the angst of agents and publishers in the world of e-books. At Bouchercon, I talked to many writers who told me to get my backlist published in e-books. I was ahead of them on that. Locally, as workshop coordinator for Brazos Writers, I organized a screenwriting workshop with screenwriter Bonnie Orr as the instructor. She preached the merits of the beat sheet. My favorite workshop of the year was in September. It was a full day workshop on the Art and Science of Investigation. Our speakers were Steve Smith, a psychologist who specializes in memory and eye-witness testimony, Suzanne Lowe and Jorge Molina, Texas Rangers forensic artists, and Jeff Tomberlin, an entomologist who studies colonization of corpses by flies. CSI is now so boring.

I began four short stories this year and finished two. I have been sending one of the completed stories to publishers. It has been at Alfred Hitchcock for six weeks. the other story appears in a collection of my short stories published by Ilium Books. Game Face is now available for purchase as a trade paperback, or an e-book in Kindle and iPad/Nook formats. I also published six of the stories in the collection as stand-alone e-books for Kindle, Nook and iPad.

The downside of  writing the short stories and publishing the e-books is that I put my novel on hold. My resolution for 2011 is to finish it.

The year ended with reviews from Bill Crider, Helen Ginger, and Jean Henry Mead.

On the whole, I think 2011 was a good year and I'm looking forward to 2012. How was your year?

Mark Troy

http://www.marktroy.net

http://hawaiian-eye.blogspot.com

Game Face

Last month I made an appeal for help and so many of you responded. I asked you to suggest titles for a collection of short stories I'm preparing for publication. I promised to send everybody who responded a copy of the ebook when it is published. That promise still holds, but it will be a while before the book is ready. I am on track for a mid-September publication date. So sometime in late September Ricky Bush, Morgan Mandel, Mike Dennis, Cozy in Texas, J.D. Webb, Kevin R. Tipple, Jean Henry Mead, Art Burnett, Jerry House, and Fred Zackel will get copies of the book. Thank you all.

Now for an update. You guys gave me some great suggestions which spawned a lot of ideas. I can't say that I chose one suggestion over the other, but I tried them all and experimented with tag lines for each. While working on the tag lines, the title popped up.

The title is Game Face
The tag line: Val Lyon puts on her game face when the competition heats up, but death has his game face on so Val had better bring her A game.

Here's the cover blurb:

Honolulu's hottest private eye, Val Lyon, has her game face on in these eight tales of love and lust, greed and corruption, murder and revenge, sports and cheating. Lots of cheating. On the court and off the court. In bed and out of bed. 

 Never one to shy away from adventure, Val drops from the sky, navigates a turbulent ocean and mixes it up on the hardwood. She faces man-eating sharks and ferocious bulls, but the most fearsome opponents are the two-legged ones. 

 Whether team sports or individual sports, the competition is fierce. It doesn't matter if the game is basketball or volleyball, or golf or surfing, the opponent is always the same—Death—and he always scores first. 

 So put your game face on and get in the game. These games are for keeps.

A game face signifies an intent to win, to prevail against tough odds. That's the one theme, besides sports, that runs through the stories. So keep watching this space and I will keep you updated on the progress and let you know when the book comes out. For now, thank you for your comments and suggestions on the title.

Mark Troy
Hawaiian-eye Blog