THE HOOK
A story always has to have a “hook”; something that burrows into your psyche and gets to your core, grabs it by the hand and takes it on a journey of narrative, with said hook staying with you along every step of the way.
But what if the hook isn’t strong enough? Or the journey of the narrative is far too long?
Don’t worry! It’s natural to happen to lose your attention when you’re reading a book. It happens, and it can be for a whole collection of reasons that can come from one of two places, the author or yourself.
The author could take the direction of the story to a place you did not expect that doesn’t sit well with you, or they kill off your favourite character god forbid!
Maybe some place else; something in the real world is distracting you or something is affecting your personal life.
Or perhaps the book is just too damn long!
Whether or not an authors inability to keep the reader’s attention equates to bad writing is an argument for another, but if you’re in a position where you struggle to follow a longer book or narrative like I do, it can be very disheartening and difficult to find a suitable alternative that one can digest easier or use as a gateway into longer narratives.
In my personal case, I find Short Stories to be a wonderful for overcoming intimidating narrative issues.
Edgar Allen Poe was once quoted as saying, “A short story must have a single mood and every sentence must build towards it.”
This is a perfect summary of what short stories should do; build upon one theme or mood line by line as efficiently as possible.
GET YOUR IDEA OUT THERE NOW!
The idea of saying what you have to say as quickly and smoothly as you can within a certain limit really appeals to my fast moving attention span. Making the work look incredibly appetising. A simple short novella provides a lot more ease to a reader whilst not inducing that sense of anxiety you could get from trying to start a 700 – 1,000 page manuscript such as East Of Eden or A Dance With Dragons.
A short story provides a quick and convenient means of being able to digest a story, but that doesn’t make it “fast food content”. Short stories can easily be just as rich as standard literature. That can be easily seen by the roster of brilliant authors who have utilised the format.
Oscar Wilde published a trilogy of compelling short stories from 1887 – 1889, Jack Kerouac crooned his introspective view of America and beat poetry with greater depth in a huge collection of shorter works, Roald Dahl famously published his more mature works such as The Landlady & Mr. Feasey in The New Yorker.
Even Stephen King, the father of 20th century epic fiction, published a lot of his most famous work as novella’s in publications such as playboy Magazine and as parts of collections of short tales such as Skeleton Crew.
OMISSION
From a technical aspect, the shortened format can be a challenging yet enlightening exercise for a writer. It can blossom incredible ideas whilst providing a format to test them out on paper, whilst the restrictions that are placed by it’s short delivery teaches the importance of direct writing. It can be very easy to fall into the trap of using over embellished descriptors or writing a convoluted monologue for a subject or topic that really doesn’t necessitate the extra consideration. In short, it encourages you to get to the point. This approach can help provide a further understanding to structure, and how to effectively use and apply it in a quick and equal manner.
Short story formats also opens the door to the most overlooked gift an author can have when writing: omission.
The keen eyed among you will probably recognise this alternatively as “The iceberg theory”, originally coined and developed by Ernst Hemingway.
In a summarised form, Hemingway developed this style from his days as a journalist, having to about immediate subjects very quickly, with little-to-none context or interpretation. when he became an author himself, Hemingway retained these values when he began to pen his fiction, effectively creating snapshot stories containing only the immediate details, no back story or prior history presented.
From this, the audience would only be effectively given a snapshot, with no immediate knowledge of information either side of that direct piece. This in turn encourages an inquisitive reader to go digging for more beyond the story they’re presented with, as the human mind really does have a hunger for deeper, implicit themes to perhaps understand something better in themselves.
So with this in mind, the iceberg theory can be a useful to a writer, especially in a short story, as presenting only the main points of what you’re trying to get across without going into any unnecessary depth or detail can entrance the reader into diving deeper into the work. Encouraging the reader to ask questions, rather than having them demand them due to a poor narrative.
Encouraging someone to ask questions in order to seek more knowledge has a greater sense of respect than providing shallow answers that leave everyone else unsatisfied.
A GATEWAY
Good reading is difficult. It should be, but it can be harder for some more than others.
But in both a convenient and technical sense, short stories should not and cannot be written off so easily as “easy” content, they can provide a gateway into a deeper form of thought and insight in a much more accessible way rather than being spoon-fed a pompous that provides an unnecessary presentation which the reader may struggle to understand or agree with.
Sometimes, being thrust into an unfamiliar scenario and seeing it resolve itself with in a few hours provides a gigantic myriad of intrigue:
“Who did this?”
“Why would they do this?”
“Was it in their nature!?”
“Is it in my nature?…”
Now I know what you’re thinking – That’s a hell of a hook.
Book Recommendations 