What length should a story be?
A short story? A novella? A novel? A twenty-plus book series?
Well, it depends on the story. And, to a certain extent, on what you think you can sell if you plan on making money.
Some stories just don’t fit in short stories – I don’t write many of them for just that reason. Novellas are a bit better from that perspective, but are also harder to sell.
Novels are my preferred medium – most stories can be told in a hundred thousand words or so. Not all, of course, and it depends on how you write (Robert Jordan, yes that is your gravestone I’m looking at).
However, I honestly find it difficult to stay focused on a single world and characters long enough to write more than one novel. Sequels aren’t my strong point. I have a bad habit of having an outline and twenty thousand words of a sequel – if the original sells, I can probably fix up the sequel to my satisfaction from that.
I would not recommend planning on a twenty book series. Not if you’re writing and hoping to be published. The first book, even if you have twenty more books of plot and story for these characters afterwards, must stand on its own and tell a complete story. Look at Star Wars. We have a complete story in six movies – the rise, fall and redemption of Anakin Skywalker. But, we also have a complete story in the original Star Wars movie – Luke Skywalker rises from farm boy to Jedi and saves the galaxy. Because Star Wars did well, we have the other five movies of the story (and umpteen hundreds of books).
Jim Butcher claims that the Dresden Files will be twenty-ish books. He’s at eleven, so he’s well on his way and is young enough and popular enough that we’ll probably see the end of that cycle. But Storm Front? Storm Front tells a complete story – of Harry Dresden meeting a challenge in the way that defines him and escaping his Doom of Damocles.
First books should stand alone. I don’t get the impression many editors are going to give a book who’s cover letter states that the author ‘two more in the series and outlines for five after that for you to look at’ as fair a shake as a singleton – though if they are impressed by it, a singleton with clear and obvious sequel hooks is likely preferred over a pure stand alone novel.
And now I’ve babbled on, its time for me to return to working on the short story that inspired this post.
Namaste,
Glynn Stewart
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