The terrible truth reveals itself

[pjthompson]

So I'm going along, all innocently, reading The Trickster and the Paranormal, getting a feel for the themes that were lacking in my novel, Venus In Transit, when I get sandbagged by the whole superstructure of the Dos Lunas tales I've been struggling to tell for the last several years. All of a sudden, connections are knitting themselves together, vast themes settling like mosquito netting over the whole sordid bog. I can see how the novel and all those disparate stories fit together, all the weird little connective tissues forming up rapidly, flesh coming onto the bones, decay in reverse. Swamp Thing.

This should make me happy, but it's got me groaning. What I really didn't need at this point in my non-career was another vast fricking story. Complications I didn't need. Why can't I ever tell a simple little tale?

Guess that's why I suck at short stories. My mind, apparently, is the Everglades.

Though the problem with those short stories may be more a matter of me not being able to refine the bits and pieces of the vast story into digestible sound bites. If I could do that, I could make some progress with the incidents of the big story, many of which might never make it into novel form.

That's the trick I need to learn.

Comments

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

*nod of total sympathy and fellowfeel*

[pjthompson]

::sigh::

[sollersuk.livejournal.com]

Some people have minds that go automatically to writing long fiction. Some do short stories. There are very, very few (off the top of my head I can't think of any) who can do both well.

I would say, don't beat your brain out, play to your strengths. It's possible that your mind just doesn't do short stories; I know mine doesn't, so I've given up agonising over it.

[pjthompson]

Oh, you know, I know all that. Most of the time it doesn't make me desperately unhappy that I suck at shorts. But I would like to master it—for marketing reasons if nothing else. But like you said, my brain just doesn't work that way. It would also be nice if occasionally my brain generated a stand alone novel rather than fricking trilogies. Shivery Bones appears to be my one stand alone for the decade. :-(

[sollersuk.livejournal.com]

I know exactly what the problem is with me, and possibly you may share it. Basically, I can't do "throw-away" characters and situations. Once I've made them I'm involved with them and I can't bear to discard them after one piddling little short story.

I haven't worried about it too much after my creative writing tutor told us that short stories can be fun to do but the UK market for them (outside of publications like "The People's Friend") is minute.

[pjthompson]

That's the crux of my problem, too, I think. I just get so involved with my characters. Even if I kill them off somewhere down the line, I know everything about them, right down to their dental health. ;-)

short stories can be fun to do but the UK market for them (outside of publications like "The People's Friend") is minute.

It's somewhat better over here--and online, of course.

[kmkibble75.livejournal.com]

As far as I'm concerned, and even with you as reluctant as you are, this makes me happy. :-)

[pjthompson]

I haven't been reluctant. This is what I most wanted to write next. I just wasn't sure what it all meant or how to make it work. I knew that given enough time, I'd figure it out, but I didn't want it to take seven more years. I think it's getting ready to take the jump now. I just have to figure out how to split up the novels. ::sigh:: That will mean I've only got three trilogies in the works. :-(

[kmkibble75.livejournal.com]

Ah, okay -- good! I misread what you said then, and thought you were bummed that the story coming together was so big.

[pjthompson]

Well, I am...but I'm not. If that makes any sense at all. :-)

[pjthompson]

P.S. I'm glad it makes you happy. :-)