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#WritersCoffeeClub May 12. If not in your current format (novel, play, music, etc.), in what format would you write?
I write novels because that's how I can best earn a living, but I *really* prefer to work at novella length—20-40,000 words, not 100-150,000 words. Sadly there's no real trade distribution channel for them in the UK (where I live) so I have to keep wrestling bloated bulky books.
@cstross I love my collection of older fantasy novellas. Fritz Leiber and Michael Moorcock in particular are masters at writing shorter stories that pack great punches.
@cstross
Which highlights a defect in the current industry because (a) historically there was a ready market in novella length works, & (b) the current generations appetite for short form audio-visual works suggests short form writing would also be popular.
Perhaps the trade might want to consider a Fiction As A Service model, where for a subscription they send out a monthly collection of short works; no doubt the writers could be paid a fraction of a penny per word. /s
@HighlandLawyer Novellas work well as ebooks, and when published in hardcover bookshops like them because you can shelve three spine-out in the space of one full-sized novel (and they sell for nearly as much): but the major publishers just don't seem to have twigged to this. Inexplicable.
Isn't Tor was doing very well in this market? They seem to have recognized the possibilities and it looks like a commercial success. Maybe not at the desired scale ...
@glc @HighlandLawyer Tor and Tor.com are two different imprints within Macmillan. And different in the USA and UK. Tor UK doesn't publish novellas, Tor.com in the USA does.
@cstross @HighlandLawyer i assume it just happened by accident rather than design, but i note that the first two Murderbot stories are novella length and they just shoved them into one cover and sold that.
so, it can be done, in theory.
@fishidwardrobe @HighlandLawyer It *can* be done ... but only by turning the novellas into a novel-length book. (See also "A Conventional Boy".) The big publishers don't distribute novellas as such: don't know how to market them in the UK.
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