7 Comments
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C.O. Davidson’s Gothic Follies's avatar

A great essay about short story writing! Thank you!

Alma Katsu's avatar

My pleasure. Glad to be helpful.

Su Lierz's avatar

Thank you for sharing this. So grateful for all the information you post. Helps me to get through writing hurdles.

Christal Roberts's avatar

Thanks for this advice! I'm currently dabbling in short stories while my novel is on submission. It helps keep me obsessing about the endless waiting for news.

Alma Katsu's avatar

Good luck and I agree: it's easier to deal with the unknown if you feel like you're working...

Justin Wacker's avatar

Thank you for this post. It is really insightful and will help refine how I edit my shorts. Also, I'm going to check out The Familiar's Assistant, because now I need to see how you went about answering that question. How much was explicitly on the page, how much was referred to in passing, and how much you left to the reader to infer.

Alma Katsu's avatar

Great point--the backstory was touched on lightly so that the emotional impact would be that much greater when the reader connected the dots in his/her head