When I was a young writer I was obsessed with short stories.
There was something about them that felt very freeing for me as a newbie; because, they don’t come with the same burdens a novel does, and even in my young writing days I could see that. If you don’t like a story, stop writing it! It’s not like you lose months and years of work like you would on a novel. For a short story you lose, what?, a week in the most. I don’t know about you, but I can lose a week.
And you can experiment; and, boy, did I like to experiment in stories! I had to try everything! Sci-fi, fantasy, horror, romantic, comedy, parody, etc.; heck, I even wrote my own Chaucer Canterbury tale, if you can believe it! Continue reading