Story Length

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I prolly own most of Stephen Kings books about writing (ON WRITING isnt the lone book. DANSE MACABRE is much better as a tutorial.), plus plenty of articles and interviews about writing. Of them all the one piece of advice that sticks with me is his thoughts on story length. He says his head wont hold more than 5,000 words, so 5K is his range. Over 5K and he cant recall what he wrote.

My range is 1000 words. For many years the state imposed 850 words on me. I hadda shoehorn what I hadda say into 850 words. The word processor refused 851 words. Twenty years of pruning and shaping and condensing.

Some of John O'Hara's best short stories are 750-1000 words, especially his 'erotic' tales. Dashiell Hammett wrote one tale, one paragraph long. Sometimes girls have more on their minds than seductions and orgasms, and they don't need 10 LIT pages to do their mischief.

 

[49greg]

I hadn't nailed down a word count that I could remember, but usually when I go back to work on a story in progress I have to re-read what I've already done before I start continuing the story.

I am constantly referring back in the story to check things that I've already written, just to keep continuity. I'm guessing I have trouble keeping track of anything more than 500 to 750 words. If that.

The only word count I've worried about is in "Lit" pages - 3500 to 3700 words. I always TRY to get a story in under that, failing that to be under two pages. I've never had much luck until the last one I got posted on Lit. It ended up somewhere around 3000 - 3100. I got several comments referring to it as a Flash story.

 

[lovecraft68]

King's limit is 5k words?

Several of his books are flat out epics including Insomnia which cured me of a bout of said disease.

I wrote 5k yesterday and am just hitting 3 for today with a lot more to come.

 

[Ldy_Sea]

Good story telling is like sex... it's not the size it's how you use it. Good stories like good sex can be short fast and satisfying, or it caan be long and lasting.

For me I write until I'm done with the story, wait a time and then go back and reread it making changes to improve it. For really long stories I keep a cheat sheet with character notes and other tidbits I will need to remember or ideas for actions later in the story. I do this cuz I get annoyed when a writer contradicts himself. One of my favorite authors does in every book he writes. In every novel the protagonist and his friend get a different back story. Sometimes they meet in Kindergarten other times at the USAF academy. I really try to avoid continuity errors like these.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

King's limit is 5k words?

Several of his books are flat out epics including Insomnia which cured me of a bout of said disease.

I wrote 5k yesterday and am just hitting 3 for today with a lot more to come.

I assume he meant story/chapter range.

 

[lovecraft68]

I assume he meant story/chapter range.

Probably

or maybe he meant in a sitting? Maybe after that he needs to clear his head and do it again.

 

[patientlee]

My Valentine's story was 10 pages, but the last one I submitted was 752 words. Cleared the cobwebs.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Probably

or maybe he meant in a sitting? Maybe after that he needs to clear his head and do it again.

I just looked, he says he went from 1K per day to 2K per day. Tom Wolfe spent 11 years writing a book...about 150 words a day. 1K seems to be the average, tho a few are hares like you and PATIENTLEE.

 

[patientlee]

I just looked, he says he went from 1K per day to 2K per day. Tom Wolfe spent 11 years writing a book...about 150 words a day. 1K seems to be the average, tho a few are hares like you and PATIENTLEE.

See above.

ETA: it took me months to write the 10 pager.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

See above.

ETA: it took me months to write the 10 pager.

Your nose is gonna grow Pinocchio.

 

[patientlee]

Your nose is gonna grow Pinocchio.

I started it in November. December, January... Months. Plural.

 

[lovecraft68]

I once wrote a 33k story start to finish on a Saturday. Started around 9am finished about two thirty on Sunday morning.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I once wrote a 33k story start to finish on a Saturday. Started around 9am finished about two thirty on Sunday morning.

I believe you! And I feel your partners pain.

 

[Swilly]

A story should be as long as it needs to be. I just wish I could type faster.

 

[49greg]

The stories I have written that I like reading the most were written in one, or at the most two, sittings. They've usually gotten pretty fair votes, at least one has an 'h' and the others are above 4 points with one exception.

On the other hand I've written stories that have taken months and months to craft, usually in sittings of several hours at a time. I've carefully crafted each sentence with massive thought and rewriting, I've put together conversations over many days of careful debate and rewrites. And they are among the worst reads I think Iv'e put out, and with one exception are the lowest votes of the few stories I have.

So I think I'll work on quick stories of less than 7000 words if possible. But then I'm writing for Fun, not profit.

 

[Hypoxia]

I don't count words while I'm writing. I use an ancient text editor (CuteHTML) that only counts lines (delimited by CR's) and bytes. When about done, I run the texts through some fancy word proctologist for spelling and grammar checks, but I usually don't read the word count. Feh.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

I have found that I have to force myself to write short stories, otherwise I end up with a novella or novel length work. I started writing this on story, it was going to be a short < 3k story. It's now at 70k and still going.

My very first story was 110k before I stopped. I actually had to force myself not to write anymore. I have since edited it down to 95K. It was posted here at Lit for a long time.

Lately though, I have found if I leave a story too long I have to go back and re-read it to figure out what was coming next. I mean I know what is coming next, I just have to find out how far into the coming next I had gotten. HUH?