The episodic micronovel. What the heck is that?
In a discussion on Twitter with #OTable folks, Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu and I came to prefer the term “micronovel” for short novels being prepared for digital readers. I write to a Kindle audience and secondarily to all the other e-readers. After publishing a few non-fiction ebooks, I’m now happily wading in the murky waters of a long-worked-on novel. But I’ve always wanted to publish it in a series. Huzzah! and Shazam! Now that option is a good one for both writer and reader. To describe the whole writing and reading experience of this type of thing, I’ve hit on “episodic micronovel” with Kevin’s nod of approval, which is meaningful to me.
Back to “What the heck is that?” Okay. You got the series part. The micro part means that it’s longer than an average short story but shorter than a novella. I could have used “novelette” but it just sounded so powdery. The micronovel episodes are going to come out about 70 pages each.
Form-wise, that’s long enough to sink into some characters and some painterly scenes. Long enough to reveal humans moving through the mandates of their minds and a few outcomes. Maybe even long enough for a reversal or three. We’ll see about that. Please join me in a crowd-sourced finger-crossing that I’ll meet my goal of publishing Episode 1 before the end of the year. I promise not to hurry.
Suzanna Stinnett
More about writing a series for Kindle in the 4-Hour Publisher
Enjoyed your blog and I buy into your schema as I am thinking the same thing. I believe there are a lot of potential readers out there turned off by the sheer volume of pages one has to plow through before they forget the previous chapters. With so many platforms now for indie writers, I see possibilities of a new wave of writing and reading. Actually, I got my idea from the old pulp writers form the first half of the twentieth century who wrote short stories in series. I have published 8 novelettes in electronic format. Episodic Micronovel is an interesting concept. I think it explains what I am up to in that taking pulp fiction to the next level with a story arc that spans multiple short stories while still maintaining reads that hold interest at the short story level as well. Good luck to you and me both