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I believe the same is true about people.
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Writing
Short Story Month (The Art of the Short Story)
This piece for National Short Story Month was written with writers in mind, but readers are welcomed. We’re all one great big happy [most of us anyway] family here. After all writers are readers too.
I did a live presentation some years back titled The Art of the Short Story. In preparing the notes for said exhibition I borrowed a large portion of material from a fellow author. She is a veracious source of information and her published works are impressive. For the presentation I also offered my own sparse works as examples.
Word count matters.
Learn how to use the word count and check it frequently.
The nice thing about writing short stories verses novels/novellas [for me] is you don’t have to fluff up the word count with senseless babbling to make sure you hit the mark. But you do have to keep the word count at/around what your publisher requires; that can be very challenging sometimes. Especially if you get too attached or involved as I mentioned in an earlier post.
Writing short works helps you hone your writing skills.
When every word counts, writers tighten their prose. They eliminate filler words, passive voice, weak writing, or tangential thoughts—pretty much anything that requires extra words. No um’s or uh’s or well’s. No “was walking” when “walked” suffices. No “walked slowly” when “strolled” captures the mood better. No drifting into a daydream that doesn’t advance the plot.
These things slip in when we write novels, but they don’t really belong there, either. And just think how strong your novels will be when you develop these stylistic choices and apply them to your longer works.
The short story can be used to introduce one of your longer works.
Regardless of the theme of the anthology, you can write a companion piece to an existing novel or series. This can be an excellent marketing tool.
For example, say you have a paranormal romance series you’d like to promote, and you have an opportunity to contribute to a horror anthology. You could tailor your horror story so that it’s a prequel or sequel to the first book in your paranormal romance series. You might even choose to weave in a little romance so readers have a better understanding of what to expect in the series. As long as the story meets the requirements for the anthology, you’ll have a great introduction to your longer work placed in front of an already interested audience.
The short story format allows you the opportunity to explore different genres without committing time to compose a longer work.
Instead of expanding your series offering, you might take the opportunity to try something completely different from what you normally write. For example, a regency romance writer might choose to craft a futuristic sci-fi story.
What do you gain from such a departure?
Well, not only do you get to flex your creative muscles, the departure might actually recharge your batteries and give you a fresh perspective on the novel you’re working on. Furthermore, you may just find another genre that you enjoy writing in and a new fan base should you decide to become a multi-genre author.
Short stories are ideal for a genre driven magazine.
Potential acceptance equals potential income and exposure.
There are literally thousands of genre magazines that accept submissions. If you have an agent great. If you don’t that’s okay, you can submit it yourself; that is if they accept direct submissions. Its easy enough to find those answers with a little research.
A short stories work well in creating a series. Think of each new release as an episode.
A series can be done on a weekly or monthly basis. This can be fun without being time consuming.
Short stories allow you to participate in anthologies with other writers.
psst, I was able to share the spotlight with a few others in Unshod
When you participate in anthologies, you will most likely have to adhere to a set word count, one that is substantially smaller than that of the novels you’re used to writing. While this virtually eliminates the possibility of introducing secondary characters and developing subplots, it does teach economy of phrase.
How to Publish Short Stories
- Submit Your Stories to Magazines and Online Magazine-Type Websites. .
- Enter Short Story Contests.
- Join a Site for Authors to Offer Subscriptions to Readers.
- Write/Publish Your Short Stories in Book.
If you have questions drop me a line and I’ll try to help you.
Right on? Write on!
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Short Story Month (Door Number Four)
Door Number Four was possibly one of the funnest short stories I’ve ever written.
It was originally written as a paid assignment but blew through the word count.
They weren’t budging on the number of words they wanted and I could not imagine what more I could cut from the story and make it readable.
We were at a stalemate so the deal was abolished. Oh well Que Será, Será.
I admit I may have become too attached to the story — and too detached from the individual $pecs. So all there was left to do was publish Door Number Four my damn self.
This book (like most) has undergone at least one cover change.
I’m not in love with the current cover but I can change it whenever I want. That’s always fun too.
Here’s the intro.
Donald S. Crowley was a CPA by day; a bean counter; a number cruncher and a certified bore. By night he was as stimulating as the hero in his latest read with all the social skills of a brick. To make matters worse he was in love with a door. Not just any door, number four was special. Donald had become enamored with her when he was just a boy and he believed that she called him by name. Now he would risk his life to see her again and to finally know what lay behind Door Number IIII.
I hope you have endeavored to read a short story, or two, this month. And if you are a writer, I hope that you have written at least one short story.
I think that’s all I shall ever from here forward. 
Right on? Write on!
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Short Story Month (August Wolf)
This short story is actually based on a true story. Yes, really!
It is not a biography nor is it considered a historical account.
August Wolf was a real person and he reportedly worked in the lab with the atomic bomb — that was a real thing.
Him being left on the side of the road for dead was true enough.
But the rest – the names and places have been changed to protect the guilty.
I dropped the e in Wolf like that would somehow protect me from his “handlers”.
I named the character Jason Carroll, after my parents, combining their names, but they had nothing to do with the story. I’m not sure I ever told them about the real character I knew named August Wolf.
That’s a little backstory on August Wolf.
No go grab a book or a pen or a keypad and enjoy yourself.
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Short Story Month (In the Beginning)
OK, I was today years old when I learned that May is International Short Story Month.
Did the rest of you already know that?
I should have known. After all it has been a real thing since 2010!
I love short stories. Reading or writing — I love `em !!
I feel like such a detached recluse for not knowing this? And now May is on its last leg; breathing her last dying breath.
Maybe that’s a tad exaggerated; but there’s less than two weeks left.
Oh well, there’s no time like the present. Right? Right!
So I thought I would start at the beginning and elaborate on a piece (or two) that I wrote.
The bait that hooked me on short stories so to speak. 
I think Perpetual Darkness might be the first short story published under Janna Hill and then I believe Perpetual Spring immediately followed. And then they were brought together in the Perpetual Series.
To the best of my recollection, it went something like this.
I was sitting at the typewriter in my office late one night with the window open, enjoying the sweet smells and familiar sounds drifting in on the breeze and all of the sudden my imagination just shifted gears — like it’s prone to do.
I imagined someone, a man, might be outside the window watching me as I typed.
I quickly found myself inside the stranger’s mind, looking from the outside in and perhaps judging each word I pecked out of the dull story I was working on. 
Once I finished that twisted little short story I, of course, had to give the female at the typewriter a voice.
That is how Max and Abigail were brought to life. 
I quite enjoyed developing the characters and then condensing them into short stories.
After a few short stories under my belt I gravitated to flash fiction which awakened a new passion that I never knew existed inside myself.
But keep in mind flash fiction is a different animal than the short story. The short story allows much leeway where the flash fiction genre often times comes in at 1000 words or less, but that’s for another time.
Now go enjoy some short stories my friend.
If you’re not writing a short story I hope you’re at least reading one and let’s celebrate what’s left of May and the month of short stories.
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On This Day ….
On this day forty-eight years ago…
In the spring of 1977 I was in the early prime of my teenage years; she was in the latter prime of her teens.
Life was stretched out before us like a long, hot summer with an endless amount of options- of opportunities and roads to be traveled.
Could she imagine that [on that beautiful spring day] that she’d never see summer?
I don’t think so, I know I couldn’t.
Did anyone predict a (legally blind) man would be driving a little too fast in a residential area?
No, none of us could foresee the future on that dreadful day of the accident.
Nor could we ever have envisioned the short days ahead.
The hazy hours of hope and disbelief and denial until …
Until there was nothing left to do but mourn.
Oddly enough (or not) I still mourn.
The grief is not near as raw and not quite as heart wrenching as it was forty-eight years ago.
It’s more like a constant dull throbbing you learn to live with and usually ignore …
But sometimes it sneaks past the smiles and laughs of grandchildren, family and friends.
Sometimes the grief creeps in among life, among the daily routines…
and all I can do is sit with the bittersweet memories.
This personal little tidbit is what inspired the writing of Odd Man Out, a short story that can be found in the collection Once Upon a Dead Gull. Or read it in the larger story collections of More or Short Stories & Such.
Except from Odd Man Out
My mother used to say I never met a stranger. I reckon she was right but that didn’t keep me from feeling like a foreigner.
I was the peculiar child that didn’t look quite like the others; a raucous summer born among winter babies. I cared too much and cried too easy and sometimes I forgot that I wasnt everybody’s mother.
Happy Friday Y’all
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NPM 2025 (The End of the Priest)
Well &#¥+ !
Between the garden and the grandkids I have completely neglected NPM. tsk tsk tsk
I must somehow set aside a bit of quality time for National Poetry Month in days remaining. I just must! Maybe I’ll set an alarm for that too. I only have fifty-gillion to five-gazillion alarms already.
So today I said to myself, “self you need to read one and post one.” Of course that won’t catch me up. So I read Too Much Pain by Donna Ashworth. And for a post I went willy-nilly and typed “22” into one of my files and this is what popped up.
Some people do the same thing when looking for a bible verse to inspire/guide/comfort and swear that fate will always give you an appropriate response.
I’m just over here going hmmm.
Happy reading & writing. Now y’all go read or write something poetic.
Write on!
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NPM 2025 (Full Moon and Little Frieda)
It was NPM 2014 when I first shared Ted’s poem about his daughter. In that post the husband and I had another enjoyable conversation about the tragedies that surrounded the man.
You should give it a read.
But now I present to you….
Full Moon and Little Frieda
By Ted Hughes
A cool small evening shrunk to a dog bark and the clank of a bucket –
And you listening.
A spider’s web, tense for the dew’s touch.
A pail lifted, still and brimming – mirror
To tempt a first star to a tremor.
Cows are going home in the lane there, looping the hedges with their warm
wreaths of breath –
A dark river of blood, many boulders,
Balancing unspilled milk.
‘Moon!’ you cry suddenly, ‘Moon! Moon!’
The moon has stepped back like an artist gazing amazed at a work
That points at him amazed.
Ole Teddy published a book of prose and poetry to his first wife [and first wife to die by suicide] in Birthday Letters not long before his demise.
Lord, help me not judge. I have lived a less than stellar life, my own poetry is evidence.
Write On!!
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NPM 2025 (Edge)
I can hardly believe that I first shared Edge by Sylvia Plath in April 2013.
It seems like yesterday and a lifetime ago at the same time.
I honestly enjoyed revisiting the discussion and dissection of Edge and poor Sylvia Plath. You should give it a read.
Meanwhile I present to you…
Edge by Sylvia Plath 1963
The woman is perfected.
Her dead
Body wears the smile of accomplishment,
The illusion of a Greek necessity
Flows in the scrolls of her toga,
Her bare
Feet seem to be saying:
We have come so far, it is over.
Each dead child coiled, a white serpent,
One at each little
Pitcher of milk, now empty.
She has folded
Them back into her body as petals
Of a rose close when the garden
Stiffens and odors bleed
From the sweet, deep throats of the night flower.
The moon has nothing to be sad about,
Staring from her hood of bone.
She is used to this sort of thing.
Her blacks crackle and drag.
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NPM 2025 (Why Poetry)
Welcome to April. Welcome to NPM (National Poetry Month) and welcome to my home.
Well, my blog home. Feel free to hang out, have a drink & peruse the smorgasbord.
Heck, feel free to shoot me a line and/or a link to your favorite poem or poet. Old or new- I love `em all.
I don’t know if I should feel bad that I’m a week behind in getting started with NPM.
Shoot I run behind on a lot of things in my old age.
And since being electrocuted a year and a half ago… well I ain’t been quite right.
I’m laughing at myself a little. Not because of electrocuting myself but because I use it as an excuse sometimes.
The truth is I have never been quite right. 🤣
Anywho, I digress.
As I was saying, it is National Poetry Month. To kick it off I’ll share a tiny poem and the cover reveal for Getting Me Back.
The new cover has only updated on the ebook. We’re running into delays on the print.
Why Poetry?
Because It hurts deeper, tastes sweeter, laughs louder, and lets me know I’m alive.
The Real Janna Hill in 