If you haven’t read it yet (or just want to read it again), click to read Part 1.
Let’s dive into a few specifics on crafting a short story, and take a look at how these bits relate to, or differ from, writing a novel. We’ll touch on:
Characters
Mood, tone, style
Story structure
Involving the reader
Fiction laboratory
Characters
Similar to time span (discussed in Part 1), the general rule-of-thumb is to reduce the number of characters and tighten the focus on the main character and possibly one other.
There might be a handful of additional bit players, or even a crowd (like the townsfolk in Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery”). But there aren’t typically multiple, fully developed, secondary characters.
You can use a more omniscient narrator to look down from above at multiple characters. But I’ve often found that the omniscient voice creates more distance between readers and the characters. This is true in a novel, but can be more problematic in a short story because there is such a word count and time constraint to connect readers to a character.
If readers never connect with your main character, the story can feel a bit drab and distant.
As always, there are exceptions. It all depends on the writer’s execution and skill.
Think about the use of names alone. If you’ve got five or ten important characters in a 3,000-word story, will readers even be able to learn all those names and keep them straight?
In my opinion, most short stories are enhanced with a tight point-of-view, focused on/through a single character, whether you’re writing in first-person or third. There may not be enough space to bounce the point-of-view and perspective around to multiple characters.
Two point-of-view characters… maybe. Even if there are only two characters in the story, you might find the story is better served by keeping the entire story in the point-of-view of only one of those characters.
There’s just not a lot of time to connect readers deeply to multiple characters.
Once again, there are always exceptions.
In my story “One Last Cup” (will post next week), there are seven characters. Five have small bit roles. Two are key characters: the waitress and the man. The man is clearly the protagonist and the only point-of-view character. But seven characters, even with bit roles, are a lot for a short story to carry.
Seven names would be a lot to ask readers to absorb and retain in a 2,000-word story, so no actual names are ever used.
The characters are described (the man, the waitress, the UPS driver in his brown uniform, the woman in the red dress, etc.), but then those descriptions are shortened to act as names (The Man, Waitress, UPS, Red Dress). While some characters get a tiny bit of description (hair color, what they’re wearing, the sweat stains on his UPS uniform), the main character (The Man) is never described at all. We see the entire scene through his eyes, so I felt no need to tell readers what he looks like or how old he is or what he’s wearing. Let the reader be “The Man.”
The intent of that choice was to avoid burdening readers with an abundance of names, and not spend the time necessary to introduce each character by name then have to reinforce for readers which name goes with which character. (Susie, in the red dress, said to Fred, the UPS driver…).
So it’s a story with a cast of seven characters, but a single POV character and no names that readers have to try to recall in order to remember who is whom. I hope it works. You can let me know next week.
An earlier short story of mine, “Desert Nights,” also had a large cast, and most were named. In fact, there are ten named secondary characters. The main character, however — the first-person narrator — is never identified by name. It’s the story of a bunch of teenagers having a beer party out in the desert where something tragic happens.
This story then skips ahead ten years near the end to show a few of the key characters gathering back at the party spot to commemorate a lost friend (so there’s that time jump — almost like an epilogue to a short story).
I point that out just to say I don’t always follow my own advice, so you’re not obligated either. Short stories are great to experiment with (see below).
Mood, tone, style
To me, this is one of the key ingredients in crafting a successful short story. Whether the story covers one scene/moment, or a period of days or years, there needs to be a single, overarching mood to the story.
This goes back to our previous session on authorial voice and how to create that tone and mood through your stylistic choices.
A novel can have significant mood and tone changes: high tension scenes, relaxing scenes, emotional moments, elation of victory over some obstacle while tension rises about the next big obstacle.
In a short story, you won’t have that many scenes. It might only have one scene.
If your story has three scenes, and each carries a completely different tone and mood, it can feel disjointed.
If it’s a somber, dark, suspenseful story, the entire story should carry that tone. If it’s a light romantic comedy piece, the whole story should support that mood.
That’s not to say there won’t be a scene that differs, but the overall tone shouldn’t shift dramatically. In a short story, that can be a bit jolting to readers.
If you’re writing a story that feels light and positive, but there will be a sinister or tragic ending that greatly shifts that mood and tone, consider layering the light and positive scenes with a subtle, underlying sense that things aren’t quite right and could go horribly wrong.
In “Desert Nights,” most of the story is a bunch of boisterous but angsty teens letting off some steam with a big party, but there’s an overall sense of impending darkness from the beginning, regardless of how much fun these kids were having.
That single overarching tone can be what ties the story together into a single unit rather than feel like an abrupt mood shift at the end.
See Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” again for a brilliant example of underlying tone. It’s an annual town-wide celebration where everyone dresses up and prepares for a festive day, but there’s this sense of foreboding that bubbles under the entire surface festivities.
And this is one more reason why it can be more difficult to write a short story than a novel.
Story structure and narrative arc
Remember our discussion of story structure? If you think about the three-act play structure, it can still apply to short stories. Every story needs a beginning, middle, and end. Set the stage; launch the plot; resolve the plot. Short stories still need a narrative arc that is cohesive and carries readers from the first sentence to ‘The End.’
We outlined the eight-point narrative arc in our discussion on novel structures, but some of those steps may be significantly tightened, or even assumed and skipped over.
Stasis might be covered in one paragraph or one sentence, with a lot of detail left out. Backstory can be problematic, perhaps avoided altogether or summarized in a very quick and intriguing bite. There could be a momentary thought from a character about something in the past that is critical for readers to know, but it’s not usually presented in detail or through a flashback scene.
The trigger, or inciting event, is likely to occur on the first page, first few paragraphs, or first sentence. Perhaps the story launches in medias res. The writer doesn’t have a couple of chapters to set everything up.
The giant middle of a novel’s narrative arc is a series of obstacles, conflicts, and surprises that the protagonist must overcome along the quest or journey.
In a short story, that is likely reduced to a single obstacle or surprise for the protagonist to face.
There will be that reversal — the change of circumstances for the main character.
Perhaps more in short stories than in novels, that reversal can be a major twist — a surprise at the very end (I love surprise endings!). As noted in the section above, that twist should be foreshadowed by the tone and mood. As always, there should be clues so when readers hit that surprise ending, they think, “Wow, I didn’t see that coming but I should have.” Make them want to reread the story to spot the clues.
Avoid that surprise that drops out of the sky, the deus ex machina ending that no one could possibly see coming.
The last bit — resolution — may not be tied up as neatly as in a novel. It might be left hanging to some degree, as long as the reader has enough information to imagine how everything might be resolved.
That twist ending might wrap up the reversal and resolution in one single sweep.
Reader as “co-creator”
One of my favorite aspects of short stories is how they fully involve the reader’s imagination, whether for backstory, character, stasis, or resolution.
After I’d written this article, but before I’d posted it, I ran across an interview with Kim Suhr where she discusses this exact issue.
Kim is an accomplished short story author, as well as writing instructor and mentor. She runs Red Oak Writing, a writers community in the Milwaukee area, where I once gave a presentation to a group of writers.
Kim also just released a short story collection, Close Call.
In her interview on Writers@Work, Kim said this:
As a reader, one of the things I enjoy most about short stories is that the writer doesn’t spell out everything on the page that would be expected in longer-form fiction. One well-chosen setting detail in a short story can do the “work” of a whole paragraph in a novel; one carefully crafted line of dialogue or piece of body language can speak volumes. The writer trusts the reader to become a “co-creator” of the story by filling in “blanks.” Playing with form takes this type of writing (and reading) to a new level. — Kim Suhr
The writer needs to plant just enough information so readers can imagine how the story might have started or how it might have worked out in the end. You don’t want to hang readers on the edge of a cliff and then leave them there, or drop them into the middle of a story with nothing to ground them in the reality of this world.
Those “well-chosen details” make all the difference.
Fiction laboratory
Despite all these bits of advice and general thoughts, don’t let anything tie your hands or bind your creativity. Short stories are a great place to experiment, even if it turns out your story is just for you and not for public consumption.
Want to play around with perspective or point-of-view? Try it in a short story. You might learn some things that will help you with your next novel.
Thinking about writing a book with an unreliable narrator? Try it out in a short story.
Do you need to improve your skills at dialogue, or character development, or raising tension? Use short stories to hone your craft.
Using short stories as practice for your longer works or to experiment with “breaking the rules” might lead to some wonderful short stories.
Plus, you can take all these new skills you’re refining into your book-length works.
Or you can put those skills to use writing incredible short stories.
Summary
No matter where you are in your journey as a short story writer, here’s the best advice for becoming a better short story writer:
Read them. Lots of them. Dozens. Hundreds. Reread the best ones multiple times. Analyze them. How did the writer accomplish that task?
Seek additional guidance on the craft of short stories. You’ll learn new things we didn’t touch on here, or reinforce things we discussed. You may find conflicting advice that speaks to you more. That’s fine — won’t hurt my feelings. Share what you learn with the rest of us in the comments!
Write short stories. Lots of them. Dozens. Hundreds. Practice and experiment.
Submit your stories. Getting your work out there, even for little or no pay, is a great feeling, provides validation that people like your work, and gives you some publication credits for your query letter when you submit that 265,000-word masterpiece novel to your dream agent.
Comments section
What’s the best advice you’ve ever heard about crafting a short story?
What’s the biggest issue you struggle with in writing short stories?
What are your favorite short stories to reread? I’ll add my favorites in the comments as well.
Next up
We’ll start with you critiquing one of my stories: “One Last Cup.” Tear it up! After that, I’ll post a few of your works for feedback.
A few of my all-time favorite short stories, in no particular order, and probably missing some of my favorites:
The Lottery, by Shirley Jackson
The Cask of Amontillado, Edgar Allan Poe (okay, anything by Poe, largely considered the inventor of the modern short story)
The Metamorphosis, Franz Kafka
A Good Man is Hard to Find, Flannery O'Connor
Nine Stories (a collection), J.D. Salinger
Little Birds, Anais Nin (content warning)
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, Kurt Vonnegut Jr
Bad Behavior (collection), Mary Gaitskill
A few contemporary short story authors I recommend looking into (not specific stories):
George Saunders
Alice Munro
Annie Proulx
Dave Eggers