The Length of a Story

[sarillia]

Is there a way to tell before you start writing whether an idea is more suited to a short story or a novel? I seem to be completely hopeless at judging this right now and I’d like to get better at it. It feels like it should be obvious but somehow it’s not for me. I look at a few of the novel-length stories I've written, and I don't know what made me think that the idea would sustain a novel, even though it did work. They could have just as easily been short stories or novellas.

I got my start in writing with National Novel Writing Month, so novels sort of became my default. Now I'm trying to write more short stories and I'm shifting my thoughts so that I assume each idea will be a short story unless it feels like it should be a novel. But I'm not sure how to judge that.

Comments

Re: no hard and fast rules, of course

[inkdust]

This is exactly how I see it. The length of time that passes is a big factor - a story spanning months with action happening throughout is more than likely not going to be short, unless it's perhaps a series of vignettes. For the story itself, the number of conflicts and steps involved in each is a big indicator.

That being said, my default mode is novel and I look at any idea in terms of how much I can expand it and deepen it with no ability to do the reverse.