Novels vs Short Stories: Novels Still Mostly Win

Almost since the invention of fiction books, novel length books have been the undisputed king. Novel length books are more popular than short stories of varying length, from novellas, novelette and more recently fast fiction.

But is it really in your best interest to write novel length books today when short stories of all kinds of length, even one page stories have found a market of readers? For one, short stories are faster to write which makes them ideal for authors who want to flood the market with their books.

Also, novels take time to write because they require a lot of words to be written. There is just so much temptation to write a much shorter book rather than a novel length book, especially if an author has a lot of stories in mind.

As the title suggests, I tend to lean on novels though I have currently written more novellas than novels. But having started and abandoned writing novels and writing them once more, I began to realize that there are a lot of advantages to novels though they require more work.

The Details:

1. Both Sell These Days

Firstly, I’m not trying to persuade you to only write novel length books. If writing books is your business or means of livelihood, then it would be good news for you to know that in today’s book market, both novels and all types of short stories sell.

All short stories of varying length have been selling well for quite some time now. They have been selling so well that Amazon, the biggest book platform in the world, have especially allocated a section of their online book store just for short story length books.

And it seems that there is no limit to how short a book can be. There are books in Amazon that sell well even though they are only one page in length. Of course, it takes a lot of creativity to sell a one page book, but others have seemingly found the secret formula.

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2. Short Stories are For Instant Results

Perhaps the reason why there are so many authors writing all kinds of short story length books is due to the fact that short stories give instant results. You can write them in days and easily make them available for sale within days as well.

In short, within days, you can already earn from your short story length book as compared to novel length books which might at the fastest be written only after several weeks. So it takes weeks at a minimum to know if your novel length book would make money for you.

With today’s already saturated book market, it has become very important for authors to churn out as many books for as little time as possible. This especially applies to new authors who are still trying to establish their name. That is why short story length books are ideal for new authors.

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3. Many Begin with Short Stories

But don’t think that short story length books are only for new and amateur authors. Many of today’s very famous and rich authors began their career by writing short stories and continue to do so.

Horror story king Stephen King and detective thriller master Elmore Leonard are just some famous and rich authors who began their career writing short stories and have done so. Even though they mostly write novel length books today, they still write short story length stories from time to time.

Besides, writing short story length books is a good way to sharpen your writing skills. With each short story length book you write, you instantly get to analyze your current writing mistakes and make improvements on your next short story length book.

With a novel length book, it takes time to analyze the quality of your writing. Usually, when you’re new, you’ll write the first few chapters of your novel with a lot of mistakes, then realize them and subsequently make improvements on the rest of the chapters of your novel.

This could result in an uneven quality in your writing which your readers might notice. Your readers might find this disappointing which could result in them abandoning your next books besides abandoning the current book of yours that they are already reading.

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4. Novels are Better as Printed Books

But if you happen to become a famous or somewhat famous author and have your books printed, this is when you’ll realize just how important novel length books can be. This is because novel length books are ideal in print format.

The thickness of a printed novel length book gives the illusion that the book has enough substance or writing worthy enough to be read. Contrast this with a short story length printed book which is thin and give the illusion that it is of inferior quality as compared to a printed novel.

This is the reason why many short story length books are formatted to make them appear thicker in print format. For example, short story length books may have bigger fonts and the spacing between lines indented or even doubled.

Also the thickness of a printed book usually affects its pricing. This means that thicker books can be priced much more higher than thinner printed books. This is why publishers tend to print only novel length books, because they earn more money off them.

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5. Novels have More Flexible Pricing

Novel length books also give their authors more flexibility in pricing them as compared to short story length books. As already stated, this happens in the printed books business but also happens in the ebook and the audiobook business.

This is because in the ebook and audiobook business, you can only raise the price of a short story length book so much before potential buyers think that you are overpricing your ebook or audiobook.

Compare this to a novel length book which promises a reader “more bang for the buck” because they are longer and take more time to be read. You have to realize that for most readers today, they still equate the price of a book by how many words it contains.

It doesn’t matter if you initially give away your ebook or audiobook for free or for such a low price. In the end, you can still raise the price of a novel length book much higher than a short story length book

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6. It’s Easier to Write More Than Less

You might think that novel length books are much harder to write than short story length books, but from my experience, novel length books are much easier to write but just takes longer. Am I confusing you?

Let me explain. I first started writing novel length books and struggled to write enough words to meet the novel length books criteria. I decided that I wasn’t ready to write novels then and switched to writing novellas which were more to my liking.

But overtime, I found that writing novellas even though they were already half the length of a regular novel, so constricting. This was because I have already progressed much more as an author and have little problems anymore in completely expressing my stories in writing.

In fact, I now have difficulty keeping my writings shorter. If you have been writing for sometime now, you would be familiar with what I’ve learned: the more you write, the more you tend to write longer words to better express your thoughts, ideas and stories.

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7. The Proof

But of course, you might think that all I’ve written so far are my mere opinions. But if you would just do some research online, you’ll realize that almost all of the bestselling books today and even in the past have been novel length books and not short story length books.

Another thing you must know is that when short stories get printed book versions, the printed book versions are usually a collection of the short stories of authors.

For example, Stephen King releases a collection of short stories in printed book format from time to time, but never a single short story book in printed book format.

James Patterson, the richest male author today has dabbled in short story length printed books. However, his bestselling books have continued to be his novel length books.

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Final Words

There is a big market for novel length books and short story length books. The simple fact of the matter is that you can write in both books format and still have a good possibility of making money on both.

For reasons already explained before, it is advised that you first start writing short story length books to sharpen your writing skills before you start writing novel length books which are arguably more profitable in the long run.

Novel length books are much easier to write but takes longer to finish as compared to short story length books which are much faster to write but are more constricting. But in the end, you don’t have to make a choice as you can write in both book length format.

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