Keeping Myself Sharp - What I've Learned by Writing Short Stories

When I first decided to be a writer, I went all in and started with a full-length novel. I had no idea what I was doing and figured, how hard could it be? I'd been reading fiction novels forever and, in some cases, just felt I could do a better job at it than a particular New York Times bestselling author who had probably been writing since I was in diapers and had several books to his name. I had an awful lot of confidence for someone who hadn't put a word on a page since getting out of school. Yet, I was going to knock this guy off the bestseller's list.

Now as any writer who's been practicing their craft for any length of times knows, I was in for a rude awakening and several hard lessons. Fast forward several years and having written five full-length fiction novels at this point, with my sixth being released this July, I've picked up a few things along the way. First and foremost, I believe I'm a much better writer than I was when I wrote Dead is Forever. Second, I've worked hard to keep any lessons learned and skills I've gained sharp since that first book, by writing short stories in between the full-length stuff. And third, I've still got a lot to learn.

I've written many shorts over the years. I've published a few, but most have never seen the light of day. Scribbles on my Word program meant for my eyes only. They were not written with any thought of publication. The sole responsibility of these works of fiction are simply to keep my head in the game between my actual writing projects.

Writing a short piece of fiction can be cathartic as well as educational for me. Some of the stories are much darker than others and allow me an outlet for when I'm feeling anything short (pun intended) of amazing... which happens often. Writing short stories between the full novels also helps me from coming down with a severe case of writer's block. It keeps the juices flowing and my mind thinking outside the box.

I enjoy the process of working through scaling down a story to fit a self-imposed, predetermined word or page count. It forces me to get to the heart of the action. It helps me to understand how far along the conflict or pain or life changing event my protagonist is experiencing should be when the story begins. It also keeps me in tune on where I need to exit the narrative, leaving the reader to understand the character's world continues beyond the ending. The shorts still need structure with some sort of beginning, middle, and end, but the art is in how to become more succinct in telling the character's story in as little as a hundred words or up to maybe a max of five-thousand words. You begin to grasp what details need to stay and what needs to be left out. You lose the luxury of having a lot of words at your disposal to describe a scene or how a character is dressed -- learning the skill of using the right words to quickly create a picture in a reader's mind becomes a necessity. Less becomes more with the ability to rely on your readers to fill in the blanks.

Who knows? Maybe one day I'll package up some of the shorts I consider to be worthy of being read by others and put them into an anthology or two. But for now, I'm happy to just let them continue to help me improve my craft by keeping my mind and focus sharp, and I hope, each book I write better than the last.  

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As always, I appreciate you taking the time to read my blog. And of course, your thoughts and comments are always welcome. 😊

You can find my books here: The Razzman Mystery Crime Files

Until next time...😎