Becoming a Writer - Thoughts?

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In truth, I believe novels or book-length works of nonfiction sell better than short stories.

Collections of short stories tend to be bought by the English/literarily inclined; whereas novels tend to be bought by the general public.

A collection of short stories, though, is a good supplement to a published novel.

Self-publishing is okay---and it might yield benefits. But I feel it's better to seek a publisher even while self-publishing. In a word, doing both is best.

Full length or short stories? I'd say it depends on how much writing you're doing right now. If you're in the habit of writing on a regular basis, why not go all out and go the novel route. If you're not, then short stories might be the way to go. I like doing short stories as a form of character development. I'll think up a situation to drop the character into and see how it plays out. I don't necessarily make it relevant to the story, but often I like the short story enough to want to find a way to make it part of the larger story. Either way, it's useful for me on a few levels to use short stories to help write larger ones. I get in the practice of writing again and get a better handle on dialogue, thought process, motivations, so on. Plus if you're the type who benefits from seeing results, you'll see them a whole lot faster that way. And it's easier to get (free) beta readers that way. A lot of them will read short stories, it's harder to find people who are down for a novel. The free readers aren't necessarily great for technical details, but they are great for letting you know if your story is any good, where dialogue might be off, if there are confusing parts, so on.

Again though, if you are a habitual writer, to hell with short stories. do your thing.
My thoughts anyhow.

As for publishing, I don't know. But I wouldn't stress that until you have the novels first few drafts completed. I agree with what has been said about the first draft sucking. it really does, for me anyway. But that's okay. It's not meant to be the completed story, just the bones of it. Unless your mutant super power is writing, it's going to take a long time to get a book up to publishing ready even if the first draft is pretty good. You have lots of time to research that and find which way will be best for you.

Jack Kerouac typed up thousands of pages on a teletype machine while high on "uppers."

The publisher liked the work which resulted ("On the Road") enough----but forced him to reduce the amount of pages to around 500, which was probably about a 75% reduction.

What I just wrote was in reference to the fact that "first drafts" often must be edited extensively.

Slightly off topic, but what about a novel about the world once there are no pollinators?

Or one in which the only surviving macro life form are cockroaches and the cockroaches are now evolving into new creatures to fill other eco niches? Can you imagine a deer, for example, that evolved from a cockroach?

terrestrial Invertebrate's have poor ability to respire through their spriacles once they get above a certain size

Forgive me while I laugh my head off! I appreciate the compliment, but I have no illusions about being anything more than a small fish in a small pond. I've gotten a couple books published on Amazon, and have contributed to various anthologies, but I'm still a starving artist. Who knows, maybe I'll posthumously become famous.

Right now, there is incredibly opportunities to be published on Amazon and other markets for self publishing.
While it's every writer's dream to make it with traditional publishing, it's very difficult to break in, especially since traditional publishers are more interested in business and what sells, rather than with art.
And for Christ's sakes, stay away from vanity presses! Sure, they want to make money... the money writers pay them to get published!
The best advice for any writer I can give is: read a lot, and write a lot. Sounds trite, but there's nothing better than seeing how other writers do it, and there is nothing better like honing your writing skills with practice.

I think it would be good to start with something like novellas. It could give you a chance to build a universe to write longer works in and possibly gain an audience. I think that, while hard sci fi might not be a huge market, it's probably a pretty dedicated one. I can think of a few authors whose work I am always looking for, and a number of them (seem to have) started with short stories and novellas which often ended up tied into larger works later.
I think there are still new stories to be found in any genre.

Well at least you can spell buddy (If I ever become a writer I would drive my editor nuts)

John licked his lips....as the sweat dripped down in his receding hairline as he ventured closer and closer to his ultimate goal. He picked up the old fountain pen and dipped the nib in a pot of India ink and started writing on an old parchment.

And so began the greatest novel ever written.....(somebody finish the rest)

Trust me, I'd be lost without spell check and a dictionary at hand!

John learned his lesson the hard way. His mixture of indignation and grim determination turned out to be the most powerful of motivators. And he would conjure forth all the techniques passed onto him by his mentor - the late Dr. Mandeville - to produce a literary work comparable to even Joyce or Faulkner... or die trying.

Alas, Dr. Mandeville himself would never see the fruits of his diligent student's labor. He had to settle with the impromptu tomb beneath the floorboards of John's study, with the bane of his existence - a poker thrusted through his skull via the left eye socket - accompanying him on his premature voyage to the afterlife. Only too late - in his death throes, even - did the good doctor realize the folly of writing such a scathing review of John's first book.

Nor did Dr. Mandeville know that John's other mentor, his dark muse, took his payment in blood. Literally. And with a price tag worthy of Savile Row, to boot. How kind of the good doctor to help John pay the full installment in advance. And who could really blame him? A lot of writers would probably make a deal with the Devil to get out of writer's block. Well, that's exactly what John did. (somebody finish the rest).


I think I got the "read a lot" part covered, and I am working through a "must-read" list of works.

However, I have noticed that I find the topics of a lot of highly celebrated works uninteresting. I detest family drama, for instance, but it is abundant in literature. As such, it can be difficult to motivate myself to sit down and finish a book - regardless of its literary worth - when the subject matter itself simply bores me.

Another question (might as well just spam while I'm at it)

- How about writing articles (non-fiction) for news media etc.?

I'm guessing that it probably doesn't pay very well, either (especially if its freelance), but I think there might be a potential for reaching a significantly larger audience…

"John put his fountain pen down, carefully perpendicular next to his note pad, adjusting the alignment so they didn't touch thus alleviating his throbbing OCD. He thrust the screwed up parchment into the wastepaper basket. The basket overflowed with his previous attempts to start a journey that inadvertently ended prematurely.

He swivelled his chair toward the window sill dotted with morning condensation dripping down like the tears dripping from his eyes. John mumbled a 1990s ballad playing on the radio which invariably triggered the ever present memory of a long lost love....(somebody finish)"

You would be competing against journalism students, out of work journalists, specialists with a penchant for writing about their area of expertise

But you have one thing in your favour - passion - and also that there is a massive market for newsmedia articles (heck I write them for free on WP )

That's more or less what they said to the creature who first came out of the primordial swamps. It is finding a way around that sort of problem that makes the story.

Didn't Zelazny write stories with insect-like life predominating?

Apologies. I will stop now with the off topic stuff.

Back on topic...with so many people writing blogs now, for free, it is difficult to get paid for writing articles. That used to be a good way to "break in," and at least you would have writing samples to show potential editors.

If you want to try writing articles, and you have a special interest, it used to be easier to break into getting something published from a more specialized type magazine. I don't know if that is true anymore.