Powerful Stories Can Come in Short Sizes!
I am a novelist. I love the rhythms, characters, and themes that can be incorporated into novels. That said, I’ve just written two short stories, both of which have been published. Why?
First, while I prefer full-length novels, shorts can be extremely powerful. I approach them much like a novel, but with only one storyline and a short timeframe. I want interesting characters and need my protagonist to evolve from beginning to end. I can’t do as much with the secondary characters, so my shorts hinge on the main character. Make him or her strong, interesting, and conflicted and a good story will be sure to follow.
The basis for a short should be one momentous event. Think about what’s the most important moment in your main character’s life and zero in. You don’t have time for much backstory and you’ll lose readers if you don’t start fast and stay fast.
Besides tackling a new type of writing, why should novelists write shorts? The latest trend in marketing for authors is to develop newsletters. Newsletters are a great way to connect with readers and energize them for new launches, events, or giveaways. Mark Dawson has a terrific free video series that discusses newsletters. I encourage all authors to check it out.
The biggest problem with newsletters—you have to entice people to give you email addresses. Offering a free short is a great magnet to do just that. Plus, both my shorts relate to my other works. Enemies of the State dives in deeper to one of the secondary characters in Shatter Point and Second Chances flushes out an important event in the Chosen Series. Hopefully, readers will be excited after reading the shorts to read my other works.
Short tories have a lot to offer novelists. They give us a chance to focus on one main character and one explosive storyline. They’re also really useful marketing tools for newsletters and novels.
If you’d like to read Enemies of the State for free, just sign up to my newsletter and I’ll send it to you. 
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