Story Length.

[TheGreatRaja]

does anyone else have a problem with getting their short stories to stay... well short. I'm working on my latest one (also had problems with this on the last one) in the fact that I seem to coming up with new ideas for it as I write and the story just continues to grow. My target was 10 pages, I have hit that and still have no clear cut end in sight.

I could always just cut it off, but that just doesn't seem to be right (ooh bad pun) Is there a limit to the number of pages that can be submitted for a story? I'm not talking about war and peace here, but it could be that the story could wind up being 20 plus pages.

your thought?

 

[rgraham666]

There are no upper limits to the story length that I know of. I've submitted stories of over 50 pages in length with no problems.

There is a lower limit of 750 words. I don't think you have that problem.

Myself, I usually have my stories well laid out in my head before I start writing, so I never set goals of pages or words.

 

[Weird Harold]

I could always just cut it off, but that just doesn't seem to be right (ooh bad pun) Is there a limit to the number of pages that can be submitted for a story? I'm not talking about war and peace here, but it could be that the story could wind up being 20 plus pages.

Word processer pages or Literotica pages? A Literotica page averages 3,767 words +/- about 750 words (because the page break isn't set by number of words, but by number of ASCII characters modified by the nearest paragraph break.) At MSWord's "factory default," that's 7-10 MSWord pages per Lit page.

Since Lit just keeps adding anew page whenever the remaining words in the story are over it's page length, the story can be as long as your word-processer can handle.

Whether it is wise to submit very long stories in one chunk is anoher matter entirely -- print publishers seldom print over 100,000 words in one volume; that's about 25-26 Lit pages. Something that big is probably better suited to serialization in ten to twelve chapters than it is to posting as a single submission.

However, your worries over your story stretching to a mere 20 wordprocesser pages are unfounded -- three Lit pages or less is probably still shy of the average story length on Lit.

 

[TheGreatRaja]

ok, that good to know then. Yeah it 10+ msword pages

 

[Boxlicker101]

ok, that good to know then. Yeah it 10+ msword pages

That's a fairly good-sized story, but nothing special.

 

[Weird Harold]

That's a fairly good-sized story, but nothing special.

Depending on font, font size, margins, amount of dialogue, etc, it should be about 1.5 Lit pages.

 

[English Lady]

That's a fairly good-sized story, but nothing special.

I think what Box means is that it's not an especially long story as long stories go


And welcome, if I've not welcomed you already

 

[emap]

What they said, also keep in mind, most of the readers who give feedback like longer stories with everything laid out at least somewhat.

Short is also good, but really so long as you have sex every 8-9 pages at least on the word program you are using people will keep reading.

 

[Jet Black]

Well, I'm not sure how qualified I am to be giving advice, as I've had quite a few people yelling about how my stories are too long.

What I would say is... Why? Why are you worried about your stories being too long? As long as it's a quality story, take as long as you want.

Their is a bit of a line in teasing your readers. I know for a fact I've crossed the line for quite a few, but... y'know what? Fuck em. "Omg get to the secks!" I'll get to it when I'm damn good and ready, thank you very much...

But I digress!


Write at your own pace, and at your own length. No need to set limits for yourself (unless you're rather OCD like me and have to have every chapter around the same length as the rest). Just write, enjoy it, have fun with it. Writing is about creativity, spinning an interesting tale, it's for fun! Who cares if it's 10 or 20 or 500 pages long, so long as the readers are enjoying it?


~Jet

 

[Quberotica]

I try to write short stories. My first was 10 printed pages. The second came in at 15 and the third passed 20 so I ended up breaking it in half.

What makes it difficult for me is I like the interactions between my characters. So the second part of my third story starts off with a long conversation between the three main characters. It's just so much fun to write for them.

Like emap I try for a major sex scene about every 10 pages. Although just for fun I'll have a small teaser earlier.