Last Wednesday, for IWSG day, I announced that I'm being a NaNo rebel and working on selecting and revising short stories/flash fiction for some anthologies this month. I am happy to report that this work is proceeding nicely, and that I am really enjoying the process. 

Editing novel-length works is often challenging and discouraging. Working with a story that can be read in five minutes, and has already been through the editing process once, if hastily, is a breeze by comparison. The best part about what I'm doing is that I'm no longer constrained by the 1000-word limit imposed on most of my flash fiction. I'm able to add those little bits that make the story more rounded, without (I hope) losing the tightness that makes short-short fiction work.

I was even inspired to write one new story wholly from scratch (well, almost--I was writing in a universe already invented in other stories), with an eye toward tying the anthologies together. At this point, I've got stories selected for a "bar stories" anthology, and a collection to comb through for one on libraries. I think the third collection will be mystery stories, and I believe I can tie that one together with the others, as well.

My intention is to bring these out as three 99-cent ebooks of 11-13,000 words each, but to assemble them, plus a couple of other stories perhaps, into a single paperback (thus making it thick enough to have a title on the spine). Honestly, though, my main intention was to keep being a writer, while giving myself a break from novels.

And hopefully, to give myself time and space to figure out just what happens in that little town where Seffi Wardwell went for a quiet retirement...

Next challenge: to create my own covers, since I don't expect to sell enough of these to pay for one of Danni's spectacular covers. I'm open to advice!