Book too Short? Pt II

Last week I offered some help for a good novel that just doesn’t have enough words to attract a publisher. A too-short novel can be a troublesome animal, but you can get that word count where you want it to be with a little creative thinking.

 When look at your manuscript anew, start at the beginning.  Of course if the opening is working, you might not want to mess with it, but you also might be able to further flesh out the set up or mirror something about the ending. Sometimes beginnings kick off too quickly. You can probably slow things down a little without hurting the story.

 Next, check the ending. Maybe there's more to wrapping up the story than you thought. Look for any loose ends or situations you referenced but never followed up on. Subplots that are wrapped up near the climax are good candidates for places to add a step or two, or to make those storylines a little more complicated.

Good novels always have ups and downs in he middle. So look at any situation in which your hero might have won a battle a bit too easily. Think about ways to make your hero fail at that point, or to make them struggle a bit more for that hard-won victory. Not only would that take more writing to lay it out, but a failure where you once had a success would probably cause you to write an additional scene or two.

If your story includes an obstacle that is there just to slow the hero down It might not be moving the story along. Your story doesn’t need such delaying tactics. This is really a weak point in your work and, as it happens, this could be a good place to add words. You can make this obstacle do more than just stall the protagonist by adding to, or increasing, the stakes. Make changes so that the outcome matters, and let it create a change in your hero.

After all of that, consider what you can do with your stronger secondary characters. One of them might benefit from a character arc of their own. That would prompt you to add smaller subplots or extra layers in existing scenes. Those characters could be used to show another side of the problem, or mirror the choices the hero makes. Or this character might face their own problems that could interfere with the protagonist’s objectives.

So if your new novel is too short for publishers’ guidelines, don’t just stretch it – make it better!

Book too short? Here's the Cure

More and more often, Intrigue Publishing receives well written manuscripts that don’t fit our submission guidelines. For example, we have found that, Y-A books aside, we do not do well with novels shorter than 80,000 words. Sometimes the prose is so strong and the story is so good that we return the manuscript and ask the author to expand it to a more marketable length. If your books is already well written (a solid plot, good writing, good subplots) this can be a real challenge. Just cramming in more stuff can make a good books worse. So what is an author to do?

In my own manuscripts I’ve found that I can actually add a few thousand words just by tweaking here and there, or adding one line of description to each page. You should also look at fleshing out some of the dialogue. That can actually make your book stronger.

If that doesn’t get you to the desired length you may have to add an entire scene or two. You have to be careful here. You don’t want to add a scene that feels like it was shoved in. It needs to serve the story and not disrupt the pacing. In the genres I write, it usually calls for introducing an additional challenge for the hero to face, and a scene where he overcomes it.

But we may be getting ahead of ourselves. If you’re an outliner like me you should first take a close look at the book’s structure. You may find that the beginning is too short, or there’s not enough happening in the middle. This process may highlight the perfect place to add a scene and fix the problem. Some places are easier to add than others.

Look at your major plot points. You have to have several steps to get to them, right? So maybe you can add one more step without hurting the pacing. Odds are you won't find it in act one. Usually there is only one inciting event that triggers the novel's core conflict. Act two is where you put most of the book’s turning points. The middle of the novel should be all about the protagonist trying and failing. You might be able to add a scene or two, or even whole chapters, without hurting the flow of the story.

Of course, you don’t want to add a step in your story that delays the plot. One safe thought is to look closely at your theme and your character arcs. Look for a situation that presents a plot obstacle AND a character issue. Or perhaps a new obstacle plus a thematic illustration. Reread your ending and see if you can add something to the middle of the book, an earlier failure that will make a later moment more poignant.

I’ll have more suggestions for filling out a too-short novel. Next week.