What are you reading right now...

[WhimsicalWonder]

I got distracted by "this'll kill ya" by Harry Wilson . It's fairly juvenile but strangely captivating. One of those read-me-in-an-hour or two types... but I've been taking it to the pool where distractions abound. Distracted from my distraction. It's awful.

[sabrinassabrina]

Half way through Digital Fortress By Dan Brown. Not a bad book. Good Read so far. Should be interesting to see whether Hale or Strathmore Killed Chartrukin. I mean, I have my doubts as to whether it was actually Hale, or have I missed something. Will Becker find that encoded ring? Will Susan get out alive? Is Mige Milken onto something more than we all think? And when will Jabba get a hint, or is he in on somehting. Does Stratmore have more to hide, and what is he really up to. Should be interesting to get the answers to all these questions as I continue on reading the book. Chow for Now.

[Suzanne]

Your comments on "Digital Fortress" would make for a good introduction for a movie. You make is sound very suspenseful, I hope you get all your answers.

[DWill]

Reading--okay, really just now finished--Too Much Happiness, by Alice Munro. I'd been hearing about this Canadian writer of short stories for a while, but the book is my first experience of her. If you like so-called realistic fiction, you might give her a try. She's brilliant, I think, at finding the strange, surprising, and even shocking in the everyday. I don't know how a writer could be more down-to-earth and at the same time so inventive. She has many other collections which I'm eager to read. I think she has written only one novel.

In one story, she has her protagonist reflect on a book that she has just picked up. It's short stories, and the character has a sense of disappointment that the author hasn't scaled the peak of literature, which is of course novel-writing. Munro here is making a self-deprecating comment, but also is saying a true thing about perceptions. Writers of short fiction are slighted. But the question is why? Why is telling one story at length seen as better than telling several more briefly? It could be argued that the story-writer's task is the more demanding one.

[GaryG48]

Writers of short fiction are slighted. But the question is why? Why is telling one story at length seen as better than telling several more briefly? It could be argued that the story-writer's task is the more demanding one.

Good point. A well-written short story does seem more challenging for the writer than a rambling novel.

Susan Shwartz wrote a short-story "Heritage of Flight" in the mid 80's. She expanded it to a full length novel which was published in 1989. The short story is much better than the novel but it is interesting to see how a story gets fleshed out, and diluted, to get it to novel length.

[bleachededen]

Short stories are most definitely more demanding on the writer, in my opinion. Short story writers have to give the reader the satisfaction equivalent of a novel in about 1/4 the space/number of words, and so have to be extremely precise in description, detail, plot, even sentence structure. What I was taught in school on my way to earning my fancy (but useless) degree was first of all to "show, don't tell," (I would never write, "I was sitting on a log...", I would write, "I sat on a log") and second "that every word mattered." In a short story, there isn't room for filler, so if you have a character leave their keys next to the bed when they usually leave them in the kitchen, that had better be significant, or you just wasted what little time you have to tell what's really important to your story. Many of the short stories we read by more well-known writers are 25-30 pages or so, but we were taught to write 6-10 pages, absolutely nothing longer. Some stories aren't resolved, and leave you wanting more, but they had better do it in a way that doesn't leave so many loose ends you wonder why you read it, but you also can't tie it up too nice and pretty, either, because if a reader can see it coming and doesn't want to follow, you weren't creative enough. We also had to work with what is called "sudden" or "flash fiction," which are stories that are no longer than 3 pages, and are usually about a page and a half, if not less. These are almost like prose poems but more detailed, and here, just like poetry, every word counts.

Another really good short story writer is Saki, aka H.H. Munro, as well as Ambrose Bierce. I'm pretty sure every American student has to read "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" at some point in their high school career. That's a damn good story.

[oblivion]

Writers of short fiction are slighted. But the question is why? Why is telling one story at length seen as better than telling several more briefly? It could be argued that the story-writer's task is the more demanding one.

I think it is the same problem as with poetry. The more concise, the more essential-pared-down-to-the-bare-bones something is (poem or short story), the more demanding it is on the reader. A lot of novels (especially the uh, not particularly well-written ones) assume they have readers who are not capable of understanding even the most blatant connection/hint/theme and will spend page after page expounding on it to make certain the reader "gets it". (Dan Brown loves doing this). Then there are authors (see Thomas Mann) who love grammar--sentence structure is his favorite--and enjoy beginning a sentence on one page and ending it 10 pages later. Admittedly, this requires a lot of concentration from the reader as well.

Poetry and short stories request the reader to fill in the blanks and read what is missing as well as what is on the page. And this isn't always easy.

[DWill]

You (oblivion) and bleachededen make good points about the unjustified bias toward writers of the shorter forms. I was also talking to Saffron about how we're not likely to see badly written short stories--they just wouldn't be published--while a badly written novel can quite easily get into print. Go figure on that one.

[bleachededen]

I've read plenty of bad short stories, DWill.

[sabrinassabrina]

So I finished reading Digital Fortress. I must say my own imagination far exceeded Browns. I enjoyed reading this book, the only part I didn't enjoy reading was the part where Beckar was being pursued by a strange man in wire rimmed glasses, I liked the idea, but it was dragged out for pages and pages. I just wanted to know whether Beckar Got shot or not, I didn't really need the extreme details leading up to the answer. I know it might add suspense, but for me, I had to flip past the pages until I reached the conclusion concerning whether he got shot or not, it was too much information for a simple shoot or no shoot. Overall, good read, enjoyable, interesting and exciting. Bit old fashioned, but I'd expect that seeing as it was written in 2000. So next I am going to start, the Temple By Michael Reilly, or Angels and Demons By Brown. Yay