Writing Collections of Short Stories

     Today I had the pleasure of attending a local writers group, Saturday Writer’s Group.  They had a special speaker, James  Brubaker, an assistant professor at Southeast Missouri State University.  He discussed the ins and outs of writing and publishing short story collections.  I will try to summarize some of what he spoke on, but this is not an all-inclusive tale. 

     The first and possibly most important part is to write the stories.  If you do not have any stories, you can’t very well make a collection. 

     There are different types of collections.  The traditional collection is made up of unrelated stories.        

     They can also contain reoccurring theme or style.  Otherwise, they can be linked.  This can be with such things as character, setting, theme, or approach/concept. 

     Once you have the stories, you need to compile them.  Things to consider are thematic movement between stories, similarities or differences in style and approach, reoccurring motifs, themes, and characters.  If linked by character or narrative, consider the linearity and other temporal concerns.  Consider the shape or arc of the collection.

     There are a number of strategies you can use to assemble the collection.  You may lead with a strong representative of your collection so as to draw your reader into the collection.  You also need to close with a strong or heavy resonating ending.  Another area for a strong story is the third story.  Also consider the story length, point of view, and psychic distance.  Psychic distance is the distance from the narrator to the character consciousness.  Avoid placing stories with very similar motifs or concepts too close to each other.  You may want to alter this when submitting to an editor, as you may want to lead with many of your stronger works, saving one for last.  Once an editor accepts the work, then you can offer the preferred organization of the collection. 

     Another more old school method is to use note cards.  Write your first and last sentence of each story on a card then lay out the cards.  This may help you identify themes that will flow together well, or places where too-similar stories need to be separated.  You can try various layouts fairly easy with this method.

     Another option is to use Freytag’s Triangle.  Here is a diagram with labels:

Using the labels of Freytag you can organize the stories along the lines, as if they are one single long story. 

     You can also devise your own shape or arc.  It doesn’t have to be a triangle.  Place your labels then list your stories accordingly. 

     You may do an arbitrary order.  Simply list them alphabetically or randomly then rearrange them until the order makes sense to you.  Sometimes just getting it started will help you feel less overwhelmed. 

     You can arrange your stories in many ways.  You can do them in thematic groupings, arranged as sets, and list them as sort of a mini-collection within the collection. 

     Finally, you need to find a home for your collection.  One method is to submit the stories to various journals for a while.  This will build credibility in the book.  You might want to try looking for an agent, but this is not easy, especially for collections, as they tend to be less lucrative.  You can also try submitting them to various contests.  The more your work is out there, published individually or having won contests, the more promising and appealing your collection will appear.

     I’m sure I left out a ton of information.  I was taking notes fast and furiously, but this was the gist of what I learned today.  The talk was informative and interesting.  A good writer is never done learning about his or her craft.