The Craft of Short Stories

[coalescent]

Chance writes:

What I Believe About SF But Can't Prove

That the ongoing collapse of the short story markets has little to do with distribution problems or any of that crap that is often cited. Rather, it is because most SF writers have no love for the short forms of fiction, and mostly view it as a stepping stone to novels, a diversion, the means to an end, not the end itself. And because of this most writers churn out mediocre story after mediocre story, not willing or unable to invest the time and skill to make something wonderful.

Some not particularly ordered thoughts:

This doesn't sound completely implausible. There's also a chunky group of writers who seem to view short stories as, essentially, adverts for novels. Mr Baxter has certainly been guilty of this in the past, though he's by no means the worst offender.

But is it the whole story? Certainly the Big Three are, as far as I know, still shedding readers, but how many people are the 'zines/small press/online venues reaching, and are they reaching people who wouldn't read the Big Three?

In addition, why are writers like, say, Kelly Link--who certainly takes the time to make her stories work--not being published in the major (genre) magazines? If the answer is 'because they're not submitting to the major magazines', again, why is that?

Further, is it anything new? I was reading the first section of Hell's Cartographers last night. This is a collection of autobiographical essays by sf writers, published in 1975. The first section is by Robert Silverberg, and one of the things that really struck me was that in the first part of his career, in the late fifties and early sixties, he made a decent chunk of his living from short fiction. He was doing other kinds of writing as well, but the the short fiction seems to have provided the bulk of his income for a few years at least, and it did so not because he was crafting a few highly-paid jewels but because he was simply churning out an insane amount of words on a daily basis.

It's also a truism these days that you can't make your living from short fiction (though maybe if you had Silverberg's output you could?), and I suspect that may be a big reason why writers focus on novels.

And lastly, and I suppose most importantly: if this is a reason for collapsing short fiction markets, can anything be done about it, and if so what?

EDIT: On a similar theme, this (not entirely serious) post by Alan DeNiro:

Short Stories, 2015

In light of what science fiction writers are “supposed” to do–be predictive, prophetic, whatever–and with a lot of paradigms floating around lately in terms of perscriptive notions of how to fix genre writing, let’s take some potshots at the future. Short story readership is in decline…I think we can all agree on this? So where does it go? What’s the event horizon? And secondly, how does this change–if at all–the creative processes at work?

Make sure to read the comments.

SON OF EDIT: via sartorias, who points at Gregory Feeley's blog, who quotes from the introduction to a collection by Robert Sheckley:

"Despite the efforts of NESFA Press and others, almost everybody is looking at novels as the measure of a writer's true quality. If this goes on without challenge, everone from Damon Knight to Harlan Ellison, from Lucius Shepard to Ted Chiang will end up as second rank, and not worthy of Grand Master awards no matter how fine their stories. And to put it bluntly, there are a disproportionate number of excellent short story writers in the SF tradition, but not a lot of first class novelists."

-- David Hartwell

Comments

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

I can't justify paying out for a magazine where I'll get the odd gem of a story, some pretty good ones, and quite a lot of uninteresting filler.

Provocative calculation: count how many good stories you'd get in an average year of Asimov's. Count how many good stories you'd get in the two original anthologies you could buy instead of the subscription. I suspect Asimov's would have a lower hit rate, but a higher absolute rate, simply because it's going to publish more stories.

But you know I'm doing the same thing; or at least, I'm gradually letting all my subs lapse (mostly because I can't afford to renew) and then my strategy will be to pick up individual issues based on the authors in them. I'll buy anything with a new Baxter story, or a new Ian McDonald story, or whatever. Of course, this gets a lot harder when the magazines don't get good newstand distribution and I don't live particularly near a Borders.

[despotliz.livejournal.com]

Provocative calculation: count how many good stories you'd get in an average year of Asimov's. Count how many good stories you'd get in the two original anthologies you could buy instead of the subscription. I suspect Asimov's would have a lower hit rate, but a higher absolute rate, simply because it's going to publish more stories.

If I buy two Year's Best anthologies, that's 40 stories. I'll probably find 30 or more of these to be excellent stories, judging by past anthologies. Asimov's will be doing well to find 2 to 3 stories an issue I find really good.

Plus, if I can pick up a book that I know I will enjoy 90% of, that's much more appealing than having to read a much larger number of stories on the off chance that each one will be good. I let someone else do the selection for me.

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

If I buy two Year's Best anthologies

Well, yes. But that's not a fair comparison, which is why I specified original anthologies. The point was more about venues you might go to get new short stories from.

[despotliz.livejournal.com]

Oh alright, I failed to read the comment properly.

I think my point still stands. The hit rate I get from a magazine is not worth the money when I can spend it elsewhere and get a higher hit rate, whether it's from Year's Best anthologies, or buying collections that are recommended to me. I'm don't buy original anthologies unless I have a fair idea I'm going to like the contents beforehand.

[chance88088.livejournal.com]

Last Anthology purchases was the McSweeney's Enchanted Chamber one. I think there were one story that really didn't work for me, a couple other that were ok and the rest I liked quite a bit.

Last two collections I read - Magic for Beginnners - Enjoyed every story, a couple less than others, but still enjoyed.

The Shell Collector - pretty much loved every story in the collection.

Probably as much as a subscription to Asimov's (I think I spent around $40 for all three) and I doubt I would have found as many stories that I enjoyed in total. And I didn't waste a lot of time slogging through things I didn't care for.

(Though I dispute your contention that YB shouldn't count - if they are new to me then they are still new. None of that tedious winnowing through the magazines, and it gives me people to look for in the future. That's how I found Steven Millhauser.)

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

Though I dispute your contention that YB shouldn't count - if they are new to me then they are still new

Sure, but Year's Best volumes are like an add-on. They exist because they cull stories from other places, and if we're talking about finding or encouraging good short stories don't we have to talk about the primary sources?

[chance88088.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. I thought we were talking about how a reader ought to discover new good fiction. (Which to me means reprint markets ought to count.) Yes, it implies that there had to be a market for it to be printed in in the first place, but since reprints for stories can be fairly lucrative for a writer over the course of his career, it shouldn't be discounted as a mode keeping short fiction viable.

I can't remember who said that you are much better off writing an excellent story and selling it many times rather than writing many mediocre stories and selling them all once.

[coalescent.livejournal.com]

I thought we were talking about how a reader ought to discover new good fiction.

I think we're now talking about all sorts of things and getting a bit muddled. :) But in terms of discovery, yes, certainly the year's best books are a great resource.

[(Anonymous)]

There are two dofferent things:

1) The way that a reader finds good fiction and new authors;

2) The way that a new, talented writer can first be published.

As noted, readers can find new short stories, and new authors everywhere: in magazines and original anthologies, but also in reprint anthologies and such.
However, reprint anthos like the various Year's Best take these stories from existing sources, and the majority of these sources are magazines.

I mean, how many *original* SF short story anthologies have been released in 2005 so far? Maybe a handful (if *that* much)?

Therefore, if the magazines die, then new, upcoming writers of short fiction lose the majority of the opportunities to get published, and so will get published less (if discovered at all).

Original anthologies and single author collections will not be sufficient to compensate for the loss of the magazines, because:

i) Most of the *original* anthologies are by invitation only: less than a handful per year are open to unsolicited submissions;
ii) Single author collections: those contain mainly of *previously published* stories. There may be one or two stories added as "original to the collection" (in order to get the fans that have the magazine and antho appearances to buy it, as well). So single author collections take over 90% of their content from previously published sources: so these need the magazines as their prime source, as well.
Also, a single author collection consisting of mainly unpublished work will be looked upon with great suspicion: obviously these stories were not good enough for the normal market place.

All in all, if the magazines die, then both the amount of short fiction (both the good *and* the bad stories) will drastically decrease, and new authors will have almost no markets to place their stories, and will either give up, or not learn the ropes (authors improve: Greg Egan's , Stephen Baxter's and Charlie Stross's first stories weren't the cream the of the crop. Without the magazines as training ground, much less new writers will come to the fore), or--by necessity--turn to novels.

Either way, short fiction will be much impoverished, and anybody believing that the same amount of top quality short fiction will be produced is naive.

And then people can buy only the magazines in which their favorite author appears (Ian McDonald, Stephen Baxter, whoever), but how will a new talent come to the fore? Without magazines, my bet is that she/he will be writing novels, not short stories.

[ninebelow.livejournal.com]

Original anthologies and single author collections will not be sufficient to compensate for the loss of the magazines, because:

What you are talking about here is the model now, minus the magazines. This has nothing to do with shifting to a different model as discussed above.

[greengolux.livejournal.com]

There are two dofferent things:

No, I think there are three different things:

1) The way that a reader finds good fiction and new authors;

2) The way that a new, talented writer can first be published.

3) The way to encourage the writing and publication of really good quality short fiction by any author, new or established.

Question 3 is the one that bothers me the most, and I think that sometimes the commonly assumed answers to questions 1 and 2 actually run counter to the aims of question 3. Seeing short fiction magazines as a training ground for new authors encourages the devaluation of short fiction. It becomes something to practice with, not something to write for its own sake, and the magazines become things to read to discover new, upcoming authors, not things to read for their own sake.