Poor novella. You’re so misunderstood. Worse, you are wholly unappreciated for who you really are. At least, as far as I’ve seen. Most publishers don’t want to look at novellas, and no literary magazine’s got the room to run them.

And yet novella’s appear. Mostly by accident, but they appear. I’ve written a few just because there wasn’t enough of a story in my head to be a full novel, but still enough to be a really solid tale. In fact, I’m writing one on purpose now. But more on that later this year.

To start with, since there is some confusion about what constitutes a novella, the general word count is anywhere from 7,500 to 40,000. So, really, any story that’s too long to be a short story, too short to be a novel.

But what would you do with a story that size? Like I said, it’s hard to market that. Here, then, are some suggestions.

• You could write multiple novellas that show a fantasy or science fiction world from different points of view, and package it as a novel.
• You can self publish it as a way to start getting yourself out there as a writer with something a little more than short stories but not as lengthy as a novel.
• You can write a novella, and then serialize it on your blog. (Cough, cough.)
• If you’ve written a few, you can use them as a sort of sampler novel and self publish.
• Also, there are actually contests and markets looking for novellas. Including this one, it’s not well known, maybe you’ve heard of it, Tor!

So it might be worth your time.

Funny story, the first time I wrote a novella, I was told by multiple people that a story of that length would never sell. According to them, I should add something to the story to make it longer. I am a fan of lean writing, but I listened. Why did I listen? Because young people are crippled by self doubt most of the time, and we can’t avoid taking advice from people we think must know better than us. That’s one of the perks of being 29, I’m not so susceptible to that shit anymore.

Anyway, I added a subplot that I wasn’t thrilled with, and drummed up some characters that felt uninspired. I added, and I fluffed, until my dark little mystery novella was novel sized and I hated most of it. I sent it out to some agents, and got a few requests for more material, but not a lot. Eventually I let the whole project go. Will I come back to it someday? Maybe. But I can’t help but wonder if it wouldn’t be doing fine right now if I had just left it the hell alone in it’s novella form. Lesson learned.

If you’re going to write a novella, on purpose, here are some things you want to keep in mind to write a good one.

Do

• Keep in mind that any story of any length requires solid writing.
• Stick to just a few plotlines. You won’t have room for long winded side plots for your characters. To be fair, if you wanted to do long winded side plots, you’d be writing a novel anyway.
• Pour just as much energy and creativity into plotting as you would a novel.
• Devote just as much time to character research as you would a novel.
• Give your story room to grow, by cutting the unnecessary fluff. Example, your character tells a cabi some dark secret, good. Your character tells a cabi some inane time passing story, bad.

Don’t

• Use novella’s as an excuse to push out a project that you’re not really done with. If you’re not sure the ending is really worth the journey your reader took to get there, fix it. If your middle is sagging, fix it. If that makes your novella a novel then it was supposed to be one anyway.

What do you think of novellas? Have you ever read one that really speaks to you? Let us know in the comments below.

I’m a sucker for funny titles, so of course this one tickled me.

Evil Girlfriend is actually two markets rolled into one. Not only are they a magazine, but they are also a small press publishing company. So, if you write horror, this might be one you bookmark.

For book publishing-

Genre- dystopian, near future sci-fi, horror, paranormal, apocalyptic, post-apocalyptic, and urban fantasy genres. (Copied from their website.)

Word Length- 65,000 to 100,000.

Wait time- Generally three months, and they invite you to query them if you haven’t heard anything after that.

Reading time- They are only looking at manuscripts from March 13 to May 1 of this year. So if you have something ready right now, sit on it for another few weeks. If you’re not quite done yet, you’re in luck.

For the magazine, Speculate!

Genre- Horror

Word Count-4,000 to 7,000

Payout- $100, which makes this the highest paying market I’ve ever posted.

Wait time- Not listed

Rights- They will have first North America rights. Your story will be in the archives for two years, and they have the right to include it in an anthology if they so chose.

As always, here is your link to the full submission guidelines. Best of luck.

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Reblogging for Throwback Thursday. Yes, I know it’s not really November.

Here’s my most recent piece. Hope you like it.

The Demon That Followed us Home

    You run into demons sometimes, in my profession. Vile little things made from bad feelings and bad negative energy. I considered them nothing more than a nuisance. Human women deal with pests like ants and mice. I, as a witch, had demons.

Until one followed my Isabelle home from school.

I didn’t even notice the dirty little thing at first. I was too busy looking at Isabelle’s torn bookbag. “What happened now?” I asked.                                                                                                     “Got into a fight,” Isabelle said, “but look what I found, Mamma!”
She held it up, and I got a good look at it. It was all black fur and teeth, with two red, beady little eyes. And I could just swear I heard the damn thing purring.
“Oh, put that nasty thing down!” I cried, reaching in my bag for a wipe. “And what do you mean, you got into a fight? Isabelle, what kind of fifth grader gets into fights ever week?”
Isabelle muttered something that sounded like, “Not my fault,” and held the demon closer.
I sighed as we walked down the path to our cottage. Deciding to use this as a learning experience, I took up the seeing crystal I wear, and gave the demon a good looking over.      “What you have there is a Koval Demon,” I said, “they’re created when someone is killed by somebody they trust.”
“Neat. I’m going to call him Bucky,” Isabelle said.
“No, you’re going to call it ‘that thing I put down and let run off before Mom had to waste all afternoon dispelling it’,” I replied.
“But Mom, he likes me,” she replied.
“It does not have a gender, it is a demon, not a puppy. Now put it down,” I snapped.
“Oh, fine,” she relented, and set the demon on the path. It whimpered, I swear it did.
We walked away from it, and I started to swab Isabelle’s hands with a wipe.
I don’t know why I thought it would be that easy to separate Isabelle from her little pet. Needless to say, it wasn’t. She’s just like me in that way, very strong willed. I love it when it’s not directed at me.
She managed to keep ‘Bucky’ out of my line of sight for a whole week before I found her playing fetch with it in the garden.
Fetch, with a demon! I wouldn’t have believed it. But there she was, tossing one of those pink rubber balls for that fussy little pile of bad energy to chase.
Well, I never like finding out she didn’t listen to me, you know? It just makes her think she can get away with it again. Deciding that I’d better but the fear of the Gods in her now, before her powers manifested, I grabbed my dispelling spray before I even went outside.
“What did I tell you about that thing?” I asked. Let me tell you, it did my heart no good at all to see her jump like that. And the way the demon hopped onto her shoulder? Awful! You’d have thought the nasty thing actually knew what was going on.
“Mamma, Bucky’s my friend!” Isabelle cried.
“No, it’s a pest, and it can make you sick,” I replied. “Now I gave you a chance, and you didn’t listen to me. Now, I’m going to have to dispell it.” I held up my bottle to spray it.
That’s when the stupid creature launched itself at my head! I screamed, and it dug its claws into my scalp, right at the hairline.
Images started to flash in my mind. I guess they must have been the demons memories, but I’ve honestly never heard of a witch being able to communicate with one. Maybe Isabelle and I are the first ones.
I saw the kids at school, human kids, teasing Isabelle. Using our proper title, the one I’ve got to tell her never to use in front of other people, like it’s a curse. I saw the little demon purring on Isabelle’s shoulder, drowning out their shouts. I even saw her singing to it at night, after I’d sent her to bed.
“Okay, okay!” I screamed. I gave Bucky just enough of a squirt to make him let go of my head. “So long as you don’t do that again to me or anybody else, you can stay.”
I held him by what I assumed was the back of his neck, and set him on the ground. He bounded right back to Isabelle, and hid behind her legs.
She hadn’t gotten into a fight all week, I suddenly realized.
“You’ll have to figure out what he eats,” I said, “because I’ve got no idea.”
“Okay, Mamma,” Isabelle said, nodding. She was eager to agree to anything at that point.
I let them go back to their game. How could I deny her one little friend in this world that wasn’t always going to be friendly towards people like us, even if he was a demon?

I thought it might be fun to share with you today something I’ve been using to torture the monsters and quietly judge people. I didn’t make this up, in fact there’s probably a hashtag about it.

First world problems.

What’s a first world problem? It’s any problem that wouldn’t be a problem without the amazing privilege we people who live in first world countries have. Like complaining that there are too many options when buying mascara, or bitching that your very expensive sound system isn’t working right and you have to have someone come fix it.

Basically anything that would make some poor kid who’s never had his own toothbrush would want to throat punch you for complaining about.

I’m not saying that we don’t deserve to complain. Everyone’s got problems, and I know there are days when enough has just been enough and the last straw is something that on most days would have made you laugh in other circumstances. I’m not talking about that here. And in case you’re wondering, I am totally guilty of some of these myself. The mascara thing was me. Really, it’s like there are other kinds of eyelashes besides mine or something.

Here are some first world problems, though, that I think everyone needs to shut the hell up about.

Electronics

And there are two parts to this one. First, I am sick to death of hearing older people complaining about how complicated electronics are. I am sick of hearing older people use their age as a reason to not get educated about modern technology. Not everyone needs to be a tech head. I understand that technology is complicated and not everyone is going to understand even some of it. And that’s fine. Don’t have it. Or if you do have it, learn about it with an open mind. But bitching that the device that I hold in my hand and can hold all of my books, music, tv, movies, play games and give me access to my work anywhere I am is ‘too complicated’ is foolish. It is too complicated for you, not everyone else.

I am also sick, to death, of people my age complaining that they don’t have the newest and the best. I am thankful to have a tablet that was brand new last year. I intend to have it until it dies. Yes, there are newer ones, ‘better ones’. But I don’t need it, and neither do you.

Studying

This is one I get into fights with my monsters about all the time. Your school is free, and you get to go to it without being shot at, despite your vagina. You have access to knowledge that will help you get a good job and support yourself without having to wait on people. And there’s a change we might even be able to send you to college, so that you can be anything you want. All you have to do is take in that information, learn it.

For those of you who are in college, you’ve got a lot of things to complain about my friends. The price of education is bullshit, most of you guys are working to keep yourselves fed. But don’t bitch about studying. For every college kid scraping to get by, there are five kids in your hometown who couldn’t afford to go at all. I was one of those kids.

And if you’re one of the few who’s parents could afford to send you, I don’t want to hear a single word.

Cleaning

Raise your hand if you’ve complained about cleaning in the past twenty-four hours. Yep, there’s mine up there. I am so bad at this, and I need to just stop it. Wait, I have to fill my washing machine with all of the really nice clothes I own? I have to vacuum my soft, fluffy carpet? I have to pick up all the expensive stuff I buy that is now all through the house that I live in. I have to make dinner, have to make dinner! I’ve missed meals before, what the hell am I doing complaining about the fact that I have to make dinner?

So maybe we should shut the hell up about keeping house.

I know that there are a lot of things to complain about. Since I might not have a lot of writing news in the next few weeks, you might hear some of mine. But I’m going to try really hard to not complain about these things, here or to people I talk to in the real world. I am blessed, to have electronics I didn’t think would exist when I was a kid, to be able to send my children to school without fear, and to have a home to care for. I am grateful for those things.

Short stories are kind of a new writers right of passage. We all write them when we’re first starting out to start building a publishing record, make a little extra money, and learn how to write. I’m sure you know I love short stories, since I publish them here all the time. I love that I get the chance to write about something completely different than Woven sometimes. And I especially love writing scary short stories. They’re fun.

The question is, what’s the difference between good short fiction and bad. Because let me tell you, there is some bad short fiction out there. There’s some short fiction that makes you want to rip the writers teeth out, and a lot of it is written by overly emotional teenagers.

It’s not the same as flash fiction. Flash fiction, as we discussed last week, is a moment. Short fiction is, at least it should be, a whole story, just not a very long one. It’s not the same as a novel, either. In a novel you will likely have plots, sub plots, lots of character development, and all sorts of things like that. A short story usually just has one plot, and there’s little room for much else.

If you want to write good short stories, and you should, here are some things that separate the good from the bad.

Not every short story has to have a moral. I don’t know why every writer seems to feel that short fiction is the vehicle for social change, but it doesn’t have to be. Yes, a lot of my short stories have morals, but not all. Gracie, for instance, is just a scary story about a little girl. Warm is just a story about a man who lost his wife. Even the stories that do have morals didn’t start out that way. I just wrote a story, and a moral came out.

If it’s going to have a moral, don’t beat anyone over the head with it. You don’t have the words and your reader doesn’t have the time. Subtlety is a great trait to learn in all of your writing, but especially in short stories.

The twist is the best thing about a short story. It’s really my favorite part about this writing form. No other way to write lends itself more to the twist, the surprise ending. The caller was upstairs the whole time holy crow moment. That’s why so many short stories are horror. They’re great for the twist.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking you’re writing a mini book. You’re not. If you have more to say than you can say in 30,000 words, what you have there is not a short story. The theory here is that you should be able to read or listen to a short story in one sitting.

But it still needs to make sense! Please don’t think that just because a twist is good that a twist that doesn’t add up is okay. Don’t think that just because you’re not writing a novel you can do things that are totally illogical. I can’t tell you how many short stories I read that wander off on tangents and don’t actually go anywhere!

Your short story is still a story. It needs a beginning and an end. Even if that end is only a few scenes. We need a start and a finish, or you’ve failed.

Make me care about what’s happening quick. Because I don’t have pages to start asking questions about this world, or caring about this MC. I need to know, in the first few sentences, why I want to read this.

Homework: Read some short stories. Think about how they made you feel, and how that emotional reaction is different than that of a novel. Then, go watch any of the Pixar short films. They are amazing examples of just how awesome a short story can be.

So I actually thought I’d done this one already, but it turns out I didn’t. Sorry about that. Here, then is Fantasy and Science Fiction.

Genre- Fantasy and Science fiction. With that title, you probably weren’t planning to send in your historical fiction piece

Word Count- Not listed. They’re very open.

Payout- 7 to 10 cents a word.

Wait Time- Generally about eight weeks

And that’s all the information they give. Very to the point, this magazine.

Here is your list of full submission guidelines.

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Re blogging for Throwback Thursday.