According to a survey by Jim C.Hines, the answer is a resounding no : http://www.jimchines.com/2010/03/nov...esults-part-i/
Also some information on self-publishing.
Do you have to sell short stories first in order to sell a novel?
According to a survey by Jim C.Hines, the answer is a resounding no : http://www.jimchines.com/2010/03/nov...esults-part-i/
Also some information on self-publishing.
I agree that it isn't necessary to sell short stories in order to sell a novel. I do it mostly because I enjoy it, and it can certainly add to a writer's reputation. Not to mention, there's enjoyment to be found in the challenge of breaking into tough markets. And last but not necessarily least, there's a bit of money to be made in it. So if a writer wants to just be a novelist and ignore short fiction, he or she can still find success, but short fiction is worthwhile.
No, I've seen authors out there where the first thing they've ever sold HAS been a novel. I started out as a fan though, got into writing via doing short stories for our Natcon contests. First book was a fluke. I sold a year's worth of true-life farm stories to a quarterly, whose editor then asked if I had sufficient of that material for a book - I did, and they bought it about four months from the inquiry. Second book was a fluke. I had an argument with a friend and spent a month writing a 45,000 word book to win the argument (and a $250 bet.) I won, and an Aussie mate I'd told all about it suggested a publisher who took it and asked for a second. I wrote that and they took that one too. The fourth book was also a fluke, I wrote it by a sort of mistake, and to cheer up a sick friend. It got showed by her to a publisher who took it. At which stage I finally got the point and started writing books on purpose to sell. But to start with I wrote short stories for about ten years, and continue to write them because most are FUN to write. (Not to mention that you can do them a lot faster than a book and each keeps your name alive out there for readers, editors, publishers...
Where can I find friends like yours??
I'm trying to work out why anyone seems to think that writing short fiction WAS necessary to sell a novel.
How many short stories did Naomi Novik publish before selling her novel series? Scott Lynch? For that matter - J K Rowling?
Some people write short stuff. Some people write novels. Some do both.
Some recent figures from Mary Robinette Kowal (who broke in through short stories herself) show that SFWA applicatoins through novel qualifications sigificantly outweigh those through short story qualifications.
"I'm trying to work out why anyone seems to think that writing short fiction WAS necessary to sell a novel."
I've seen it repeated in several places, along with a lot of other myths.
Well, I'm afraid that friend one got out of the business, friend two is an Australian small press editor and writer who just happened to know about that market, and friend three died five years ago. As I said, series of flukes and good friends. But I do have a fair number of friends who are in the business, we network, it's fun and profitable. As in, a friend of mine had sold a number of her (brilliant) short stories in reprint to a magazine publisher. They were running out of hers and the publisher asked if she could recommend anyone else who might have a stack of reprint possibilities. She recommended me. I've subsequently sold a bunch of stories, then two books and a short story collection to the publisher. Network! Believe me, you may lose the occasional sale because an editor preferred their story to yours after you told her about a market where you sell, but in the end you'll be told about good markets where your work fits and make sales more often.
>I'm trying to work out why anyone seems to think that writing short fiction WAS necessary to sell a novel.
It's suggested because for a lot of people, it's a good way to learn the craft and the discipline necessary to play the game. It's much easier to write a short story and get turned down than it is a novel, because you put a lot less time into a short story (or most people do)
it's like playing short piano pieces when you're learning, and graduating to hour long recitals after some practice.
Oh, I'm not disputing that the advice is well-meant, and often well-advised - as noted, most of the people I know who've sold novels have gone the short fiction route first. But many very well-known novelists out there at the moment have no short fiction credits to their name. There is a world of difference between "writing short fiction can help you to write (and sell) a novel" and "you can't sell a novel without writing (and selling) short fiction first" and I guess it's kind of depressing to see how one thing can apparently be so easily twisted into the other.
It certainly isn't necessary to write short fiction first. And truth be told, the art of writing a novel is much different than writing a short story. Just because you can write a good short story doesn't mean you'll do well at writing a novel. That too takes some learning of new skills, mainly in the plotting arena (plots need to be much more complex, characterization more in depth, etc.) and you have more time for scene setting and building up to a climax, which also means you have to learn how to keep those longer build-ups interesting and fun.
There are also a lot of novelist who never are able to break into the short story market due to the different skill set, and short story writers who never successfully write a compelling novel that can sell. A person can learn how to do both, but it isn't a given that because you are a good short story writer that you will be a good novel writer.
What short stories first can gain a person who successfully breaks into novel writing is time to learn the skill of good writing, characterization, economy of words, natural dialog, and stuff like that which can help in writing a novel. It also can help gain a readership to some degree, which any publisher will appreciate an author bringing to the table. And if you're able to get into some top short story publications, it can let a publisher know you at least have some writing ability that can sell. Though, of course, the proof will be in the pudding when they start reading what you've written.
But, no. Many novelist started off as novelist in their careers, later maybe writing some shorts for marketing more than anything.
A better question might be, does a lack of success selling shorts indicate anything about you novel writing (and selling) potential?
Mike
Michael D. Turner
Mr. Yoop's Soup:http://www.amazon.com/Shadows-Emeral.../dp/0973483717
Psyched Up:http://www.amazon.com/Turn-Other-Chi...0046452&sr=1-1
An Incident at Black Tongue Tavern:http://www.amazon.com/Bash-Down-Door...6&sr=1-1-fkmr0
I wouldn't think so in general. The two require different writing styles, either of which you could be good (or bad) at.Originally Posted by erazmus
Of course, there are always going to be those unable to sell shorts or novels for the same reasons (related to inexperience)...
However, it could be that a writer does an excellent job of constructing longer works, where they have more room to expand on details, but can't write a short story to save themselves.
The reasons people are generally urged to sell short stories are:
1. gather some name recognition - it never hurts to have fans and for your name to be out there
2. gather some experience submitting stuff - it's much faster to write short stories than novels for most people, and if you're churning out shorts and submitting them, you can get a lot of experience at the submission game under your belt in a relatively short time.
3. gather some experience with the critting/revising/rejection process - shorts allow you to go through all of those events a lot in a fairly short amount of time, gaining you a nice chunk of experience points that forces you to mature fast. Novels take much longer, not only to crit and revise, but also to go through the route of getting to a publisher, getting through the slush pile, and getting a response of some kind back to you.
For most people, it's a good idea to get as much of that sort of experience as possible, as fast as possible in order to turn from a newbie with stars in his eyes and visions of Hollywood grandeur with 6 or 7 figure advances, into a mature author who sees this industry for what it is - a job and a marketplace with a lot of steep, bumpy hills to climb, and the endurance to do the climbing.
Heck, I'd say it doesn't even indicate anything about your short story writing and selling potential! That 64th rejection could just be one more step on the way to that golden first acceptance.
Totally agree with CW's post. Learning the craft through short stories has definitely been a lot less painful for me than it would have been getting slogged up in the novel submission process.
Robert Orme
Not that I'm some super success or anything. But...
1. I wrote about 8 books had nooooooo luck getting even a bite.
2. Decided to write short stories to get my name out there and network.
3. It took about two years of this.
4. Now I have my first book out and 3 more on the way with different publishers.
5. So in my opinion yes, short stories come first.
MDG
I started with short stories, I'd sold a number before my first book was accepted, and I continue to write them for three reasons, I enjoy writing short stories, they are an excellent way of keeping editors and readers reminded of your name (I sell to a number of theme anthologies each year and several magazines) , and often a plot fits a story nicely where it is too slight for a book.
But looking at other writers it's clear that not writing short stories and still selling books is an option, a friend of mine who writes mystery/supernatural crossovers wrote no short stories, she sold her first half dozen books before she ever did a short story, she writes the occasional short story for specific markets and on request nowadays, but she has probably written and sold more books than short stories. Another mystery-writing acquaintance has a similar history. It's interesting to note that both authors are mystery writers, maybe for that genre you don't need the short stories so much, where with our genre it does seem that having a number in publication CAN be an advantage...
One more thing I'll add. In general Books tend to make a bit more money than short stories.
It is virtually impossible to make a living selling short fiction. Certainly some people have done it. Back in the '30s Robert E. Howard was the wealthiest man in Cross Plains TX, and that was on short fiction. Still, everyone was broke at the time and it's not like Cross Plains was someplace rich and sissified like Kansas City.
Since I've stumbled into posting here when I hadn't really planned to, I should likely leave an on-topic thought.
Three words convince new writers that you need short fiction under your belt to sell a novel: no unagented manuscripts. That nightmare-inducing requirement tells newbies they need an agent to sell a novel and presumably sales to get an agent. Since you need scratch to make scratch but you can't get scratch unless you already have scratch, writers assume those sales have to come from the only market that - we are told - will accept unagented fiction: the magazine market for short stories.
Last edited by Greybeard; June 2, 2010 @ at 9:22 PM.
It doesn't help that professional publications often back up that myth. One of the first resources I looked to when getting into the business of writing was Getting Your Book Published For Dumbies, a book which spells out in plain terms that you need some published fiction under your belt before you can have a reasonable shot at selling a novel to a publisher.
Robert Orme
But Robert, that just isn't true. It doesn't hurt but it also just doesn't help that much.
First, to sell a book you must produce book-length manuscripts. You can not sell what you don't have. Book length doesn't just fall out of your word processor, it takes a bit of time, so you have to have a Ms ready.
Then you need to get your Ms in front of an editor. There are many ways to do that, the most accepted of which is to put it in front of a lot of agents until one agrees to take you on as a client. Obviously this does work. But many agents don't care about, or even read about in your cover letter, your short-fiction sales. Most care about the writing sample you send them, the Ms you have available for them to sell. If they think they can sell it, chances are they'll take you on for a try. If they don't think they can sell the Ms they are looking at, they don't really care how many short stories you've sold to how many top-level markets.
Fortunately, agents are not the only way to get your manuscripts in front of editors. There are writer's conferences, many of which allow you an opportunity, often for a fee, to get ten minutes (or more) with a working editor from a publishing house for a pitch session. This can result in an invitation to submit, allowing you to mail a Ms to a publishing house with that all important "requested material" mark on the package, which gets you around that nasty "no unagented submissions" clause that 90% of all publisher seem to feel is critical to the smooth functioning of their operations.
Or you can just button hole an editor somewhere else with a pitch. I've seen this work, I've seen this work on-line! Famously, John Ringo got into an argument with Jim Baen, on Baen's web-forum, and rather pissily snarked that he wouldn't press his argument any further because he had a Ms in Jim's (open) submission pile and didn't want to kill its eventual chances. Jim said something like "Here, I'll look it over right now and give you a reply, and then you can go on with your argument". And he bought it (made an informal offer right there in the thread). John has gone on to make the NYT (extended) Best seller's list, for Baen, and has what seems to me a gazillion books out. Here's the kicker and my point, Jim Baen didn't read his own slush pile as a matter of habit, he had other people reading and screening it and if JR had just not said anything there is a very good chance his (perfectly good) manuscript would never have crossed Baen's desk. Getting your Ms in front of a guy who can say "yes, I'll buy it" is the end all, be all of submitting and the only route to selling a book. It doesn't really matter how you do it.
And there are still open submissions at mass market publishing houses. Baen, Tor, DAW, Juno, Pyr, and others take some form of unsolicited submission. That's just off the top of my head. And none of the editors there seem to care overmuch if you have had a couple of stories in Analog or not. Sure, if you've won a Hugo its nice, they can put that on the book cover, but every one of them seems most intent on the writing you put in front of them and the pitch/proposal you send along with it. And why shouldn't they be? Your story in Analog doesn't reach enough readers to assure a profitable paperback run. Even if every one of them bought a copy. That's why writers with a track record writing novels have a better chance of getting published in the major magazines, they already have enough readers to potentially make a difference in sales for the magazine. The reverse just isn't true and hasn't been for a long, long time.
Mike
And I see, on rereading your post, that you were saying that. Sorry.
Remember, the book cited clearly says its "for Dummies" in the title.
Mike
Last edited by erazmus; June 10, 2010 @ at 1:02 PM. Reason: clairity
Michael D. Turner
Mr. Yoop's Soup:http://www.amazon.com/Shadows-Emeral.../dp/0973483717
Psyched Up:http://www.amazon.com/Turn-Other-Chi...0046452&sr=1-1
An Incident at Black Tongue Tavern:http://www.amazon.com/Bash-Down-Door...6&sr=1-1-fkmr0
I've heard the argument run both ways. I've heard professional writers say that short stories do matter, because a following from Analog is much better than no following. I've also heard it doesn't matter at all. I think it falls somewhere in the middle. Yeah, it's great if you make a few pro sales and even better if you can win a Hugo. But is that the only way? I don't think so. You can have no short fiction sales and still sell a novel. The problem is that some writers have trouble selling short stories to the major markets (or any markets) and thus can't benefit from that route. This could be due to their preferred genre, or the writer's style, or that the writer simply is not that great at writing short fiction. Some writers are outstanding at novels but just can't get it together with short fiction. It happens. So I think the answer is this: You don't need to, but it can certainly help if you can pull it off. You still have to be good at writing novels either way.
A buddy of mine, Tim Wohlforth, recently made a couple of sales (including Harry, a very fine bio-terrorism thriller) to Whiskey Creek Press, an independent. Their only absolute rule was that each of their writers must have a personal author website. Get it? They want to know that the authors understand (and are visibly committed to) the business end of bookselling.
Vis-a-vis short stories, they want to know about any that got published. Why? Biz again. They want committed career authors, not One Book Wonders. Who can blame them?
For a link to Harry use: http://www.whiskeycreekpress.com , then find the book under the search term "Harry."
Dean Wesley Smith stated on his blog lately that for the first time in many decades it's possible for a writer to make a living at short fiction. The change, I gather, is that once first North American serial rights are sold, and the story itself is printed, the writer can put it up on Smashwords and similar sites for a buck a story and keep making money with it.
Greybeard, I think you're onto something there. But I'm thinking short collections, let's say 4 to 8 stories, would sell better than individual stories. Still, it's an exciting time to be a fiction writer. The technology and business are changing every day, opening up new opportunities.
tyjohnston.blogspot.com
My first thought was of short story collections, but I notice that both DWS and his wife Kristine Kathryne Rusch have single stories out selling for a buck or so. I'd be curious to see a breakdown of the sales.
Another issue is that short fiction sells to magazine markets largely in specific lengths (say 10,000 words and under, although 10,000 is stretching it) but there is no limit for online work. Online, 25,000 words - a length nearly impossible to place these days - could sell just as well as 5000 words, or 100,000.
It is certainly an exciting time to be a fiction writer. Now I just wish I weren't so out of practice at it.
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