Short vs. Long

A.P.M. said:

So, here's a complicated question/discussion for my fellow erotica writers out there-the question of a series of shorter (think 20-30k word) novellas, or one long, complex story. What fits erotica better?

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The trend in ebooks seems to be moving towards shorter and shorter 'novels' (they don't say novella much). This is just based on my observations of listings on ebook catalogs.

I think that since you can't heft an e-novel, you don't make the association between value and size that you do in a bookstore.

Also, people seem to have caught onto the 'long tail' philosophy of having a lot of cheap e-books out there, each one earning a small amount, than few more expensive ones that sell less frequently. So, according to this, better to sell four 20,000 word ebooks at $1.99 than one 80,000 wd ebook at $5.99.

I also write Erotica and think people would look at the content of the book, whether the story captures them from the inside or back of the book, then the price. I know as a buyer, that's the first thing i do. If the book is really interesting and i can't get it cheaper after searching online, i'll buy it at whatever price its listed at, but the cheapest i can find.

I've been thinking a lot about this lately because I need to make some decisions. In general, I think the answer varies with the total amount of writing planned or possible. In my case, I have enough material for a full length novel, but I've been pulling out pieces to submit as short stories. I doubt I'll write more than one novel in the foreseeable future, so for me, several short pieces makes sense. I'm at the point of possibly grouping the remaining chapters into two or three shorter ebooks.

For anyone, I think each separately released story puts the author's name out there. I've learned about many of my favorite authors through short stories in anthologies (almost always print, so the issues are a little different). This is one reason a small flat-rate payment for print anthologies is worthwhile, even if it doesn't bring in much money.

Business aside, I prefer reading erotica in shorter works.

dangerousbill said:

The trend in ebooks seems to be moving towards shorter and shorter 'novels' (they don't say novella much). This is just based on my observations of listings on ebook catalogs.

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I think you might be looking at the wrong ebook catalogs. Most erotic romance and erotic publishers I've researched and subbed use the term 'novella'.

And yes, when it comes to erotic, I see a preference for shorter stories, both novella and short story length. Publishers define 'novella' differently so word count restrictions can vary.

in general... and this is not any one firm publisher, just a rough estimate based on what I can remember off the top of my head... Short stories start at 5k low-end and go up to about 15 to 20k. From there to about 30 to 40K are classified novella and over that you get into short novel (or category length), novel and long novel. Some publishers lean toward longer works but when you have novella and below, the books are usually erotic romance or erotica.

I like this length for writing hotter stories as well. I've noticed that the higher the heat or sensuality level the lower my overall word count. My full-lengths are mainstream romance and my short stories are erotica. That is probably a natural result of writing closer to the couple... less outside plot, but it also means my stories fit in well with the publisher conventions.

Outside epublishing the ballgame changes, of course. When people buy a book they want a 'whole' book, regardless of heat level.

yea what Voirey said

The way these things are usually prices, you make the most per word in the novella range.

There's no hard and fast answer here. Publishers are picking up more novellas; I know several self-pubbers have done brilliantly with long online series condensed into fat novel-size releases.

Just to add to this thread, the shortness of a story really depends on the publisher more than anything. As someone earlier said, some publishers consider 15,000 words to be a short story. However, I do think that between short stories, novels, and novellas/novelettes, novellas, novelettes, and short stories are seen more. Short stories, from what I see, are usually put together as a collection (by one author) or an anthology (multiple authors). Now, if this equates to a novel/novelette/novella, again, depends on the publisher. They decide what stories go in or not.

A.P.M. said:

So which wins out when it all comes down to books sold, in your experience-price or preference? Judging from the amount of shorter novellas I see, I'm guessing this is one case where the publisher knows best. I'm relatively new to all this, though, so I'm curious to see other people's thoughts on the subject.

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Prolific writers would like to write shorter pieces, because in today's market, especially the erotica e-book market, your income depends more on the number of pieces you write rather than the number of words you write.

If you go to erotica e-book sites, you may see that most stories are grouped by genre. My sense is that people shop for stories by genre rather than length, because sexual preferences tend to be very specific.

My own reading preference is stories that allow some character development, say, 20K words and up. This is not to say that there aren't some very good erotic short stories out there that appeal to my own particular perversions.

My writing preference is novel-length stories of at least 50K. My two published novels are 92K and 57K, and my wip will top out around 60K.

VoireyLinger said:

I think you might be looking at the wrong ebook catalogs. Most erotic romance and erotic publishers I've researched and subbed use the term 'novella'.

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An unfortunate proportion of erotica publishers don't include any information about length or word count at all.

I tend to avoid those sites. It would infuriate me to pay $3 for a story that turned out to be 3000 or 4000 words long, when I thought I was buying a novel.

dangerousbill said:

My own reading preference is stories that allow some character development, say, 20K words and up.

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From what I'm seeing, that is a short story and/or novella for some publishers. I could be wrong though.

Oh, I was going to say girth mattered more than length, but then I read the rest of the post. My bad.

Victoria, I don't know how many times I've had that thought when I see the thread title. Make that our bad, huh?

Maryn, moving slowly today

Silver-Midnight said:

From what I'm seeing, that is a short story and/or novella for some publishers. I could be wrong though.

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The lines have started to blur on the terms used to refer to story length.

Used to (like a few years ago) it went something like: Flash - under 1k; Short story - 1.5k to 7.5k (notice the interesting frustrating gap between "flash" and "short"); Novelette - 10k to around 18-20k; Novella - 20-35k; Novel - 45k and up.

Of course, the numbers were always flexible but lately it seems the term novelette is not being used much and anything bigger than a short story and smaller than a novel is just a "novella".