  Short Stories
This week: Those in Front of the Curtain Edited by: Ben Langhinrichs  
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Greetings! I am one of the editors for the Short Stories Newsletter, and I hope to share some of my thoughts on writing short stories, and perhaps about writing in general. I suggest you treat these not as pearls of wisdom dropped from on high, but rather musings of a fellow writer, written to inspire, provoke or stimulate your personal muse. I welcome your thoughts, feedback and suggestions.
~ Ben Langhinrichs |
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Pay Attention to Those in Front of the Curtain
The famous quote from the Wizard of Oz is "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain." The Wizard didn't want Dorothy and her friends to know that he was a small, powerless man, so he projected a fiery image of OZ, the Great and Powerful, with a booming voice. When Dorothy's dog, Toto, pulls back the curtain, the real man is revealed.
As writers, we are the little men behind the curtain, frantically pulling levers and blowing smoke so that our readers will enjoy a good story without thinking about us. We try to hide our true selves to maintain the illusion.
But the wizard needs to be able to see his audience in order to gauge their reactions. As writers, we don't have that luxury, so we need to imagine the audience for our story and cast our spells and blow our smoke appropriately.
I have been reviewing a novel for a friend, and while the vision and story are quite good, the novel suffers from a lack of view of the audience. In some places, it is too YA (young adult) for adults, while in others it is too adult for teens. The author is going to have to choose one audience or another and rewrite to meet that audience.
You are about to sit down and write a short story. Who do you imagine reading the story? If you say, anybody might read it, you are also saying that you will have to write it with universal appeal, which is tough. If you say, it is for thirteen year-old girls with green bicycles who live in the San Francisco Bay area, you may have an easy time focusing on the audience (especially if it includes you), but a hard time finding the size audience you might want.
The two distinctions authors tend to make most often about their audience are age and gender. Assumptions such as teenage girls like paranormal romance and men like sports books may not always hold true, but they are rough guidelines authors use.
But what about race, religion and ethnicity? It is ridiculous to think that people only want to read about people like themselves. After all, that would eliminate most of horror, science fiction, paranormal romance, etc. On the other hand, people do like to see some people like themselves, especially in situations that are supposed to feel familiar.
What about economic diversity? Will what you write make people uncomfortable if they have much more or much less than you assume? It is fine to have characters who are very poor, who are middle class, who are rich, but be aware of what that is likely to mean to your audience.
In other words, take a peek out past the curtain. If the faces you see looking back aren't the ones you expect, will the story work? Might it offend them? Bore them? Intrigue them?
I can't offer many suggestions about how to react to your possible audience, but I can suggest that you look at them carefully. The curtain can block one's view from either direction.
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On a side note, I also edited the Horror/Scary Newsletter this month. If you would like to read that as well: "The Unsparkly Undead - Zombies"
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Feedback from readers
The newsletter these readers were responding to is "Publishing Stories in the 21st Century"
SantaBee  I hear a lot of good stuff about Smashwords. Thanks for the article and good luck on sales!
BIG BAD WOLF is Merry  offers Things I've made. with the comment: You know, it is sort of funny. My interactives have almost 19,000 views compared to 7,000 views for my static items. However, My Static items have almost 420 Rates to 70 Rates for my interactives. 
Submited item is a list of the things I've made, seperated into catagories.
Joshiahis  offers A Wasted Life with the comment: Very, very cool newsletter. It's hard to learn all aspects of the business of writing. It's easy to get lost, when all you want to do is write something that will be read. ~ Lee
LJPC - the tortoise Hi Ben! Thanks for the great overview of traditional publishing vs self-publishing. Things certainly are changing with the introduction of the Kindle and the plethora of ezines among other things. You wrote a balanced account of all aspects. It's great to experiment. Prestige still counts for something, but there are many more choices now, depending on an author's goals. Thanks for an excellent newsletter.  -- Laura
Nomar Knight Once again you provided useful information and shared your vast experience with us. You wrote another good newsletter. Thanks for sharing.
alex3  I wrote a six-episode series, the first of which has a front-loaded back story on the two principals. I was criticized for it and was preparing to tear it all up to allow more immediate action. Then, I picked up a book,'Call for the Dead', by my idol, John Le Carre, that spends the first chapter on his back story of George Smiley. It convinced me that immediate action is not ALWAYS the iron clad formula.
faithjourney Indeed, the Internet has opened up many options for writers to get their work "out there." there are many great options now.
J. A. Buxton  First, thank you for including my "Chocolate and the Five Senses" in your newsletter.
You mentioned POD companies, and that's the way I decided to publish all my books. After much research of the companies available, I chose E-BookTime.com to handle my first novel, Home of the Red Fox. They did such a good job, I am currently having them publish that novel's sequel, Home of the Gray Dog.
atwhatcost Ben Langhinrichs wrote, "I have had 26 stories and 27 poems published via the more mainstream magazines and e-zines, and I doubt that one of them has been read by over 3000 readers."
Wow, what a statement! What mainstream magazines and e-zines wouldn't net you 3000 readers, at least? I'm not a big fan of poetry, but even I read the poems that Reader's Digest publish. Isn't that the purpose of mainstream mags - to get people reading things we don't seek out? I sure hope you underestimate your readers.
Jeff  Great NL this week, Ben! Very informative!
Fyn-elf  RE:Self-publishing is publishing without the editor.
I work, as an editor, for a small press. We are, I'd say, about three steps up from a vanity press and a few down from a 'publishing house.' Do authors pay? Yes. But nowhere near some of the vanity press charges and they get a full edit, marketing, book signings, reviews, publicity and their book in Borders as well as on Googlebooks and Amazon. We also have an on-site bookstore that carries not just our stuff, but any 'self published' author who wants their books there.
Researching what is available and what the bang for your buck is, is key!
Christopher P. Kohls This is a random message, nothing to do with the newsletter, but it regarding short stories, so I thought it was appropriate.
I noticed there are a LOT of options under "Genres" when creating a static item. I uploaded a story today in which I had a bugger of a time finding appropriate genres. I wanted to select "Journey" or "Quest" and "Collegiate" or "Academia," or something similar to these options. Alas, there was nothing like them. I ended up selecting "Travel" which I don't think is right, and nothing relating to University, which I think was an important theme of the story.
I don't know how difficult it is to add these genres, and I'm sure there are a million other genres you could add, but I thought that the sentiment should be shared.
Thank you,
Chris Kohls
PS I added the same item to highlight as another letter I sent to this newsletter a moment ago. I don't know if that's appropriate or not.
Christopher P. Kohls offers The Devil's Advocate with the comment: Hello Ben, you wrote in the last newsletter that you had a poem that you "promoted ... to some degree." I was really hoping that you were going to give some hints and tips regarding your methods of promotion. I know that many people don't want a story promoted on WDC as they maybe want to sell the work later for print or to a prestigious e-zine or something. However, a lot of people would love that kind of view count and I'm sure I'm not to only one interested in your secrets of promotion.
Thanks,
Chris Kohls
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Short Stories: October 06, 2010 Issue [#4003]
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