How Long Should a Short Story Be?

I’ll Google this, but I have been working today on Resurrection and it’s going to run 9-10 pages, probably 3,000 words. Too long?

Also what about detail? If I provide details of each action, I think it might be boring. For instance, my main character meets someone at a pizza place. The pizza place has no relevance to the story. Should I describe in any detail what the waitress was wearing or how the tables were covered with checkerboard red and white vinyl, worn at the corners?

Creative Writing 101

Well, I got some (very little) feedback on my two pieces of creative writing–one short story beginning and one partial book chapter. They have some potential (though maybe I should say I have some potential–I can write fiction people may want to read.)

I’m going to ask for more reviews over at WhoreChurch, since I get far more traffic there. Maybe I’ll get more input and discover what will make my writing better before I get too much further.

I’m not sure if I want to finish each of these, though I will likely finish “Resurrection” since it’s 1/3 done and is just a short story.

I also think Dahlia has potential, though it needs MUCH work. I learned a lot doing it and putting it up for review, and I got a ton of helpful feedback. It helped me see the difference between writing things that ryhme and poetry. Big difference.

Right now I wonder if I want to write fiction. Is it fun? Beats me. When it’s easy, it’s fun. But if I want to write well enough to get it published that sounds like work. I’m not sure I want the work.

At some point I start asking “what’s in it for me”–will I enjoy it? Will the payoff equal the effort? Will it support my family? I’m very practical minded: Will it sell? Does it give me an immediate pay off? Blogging is fun because within minutes someone laughs. Writing fiction is less so–will there ever be a pay off?

Another thought it why write fiction when I make a good living writing non-fiction?

Just some rambling thoughts on writing non-fiction.

OK, tell me if either of these are worth it…

I just posted two pieces of writing–one if for a book project and one is the first part of a short story. I’m not good at judging these. Are either any good or are they amateurish? Do I need to take a class or something? I’m interested in any real and honest input, even if it’s negative.

Book Project - Chapter One

Resurrection, Act I

Resurrection, Part I

Tom Sibley loved his watch. His father, a physician of no small reputation in the “hills and hollers” surrounding Silerville, Kentucky, had left it to him. After 25 years on his father’s wrist and then almost 15 on Tom’s, the watch body had it share of marks and scratches. Upon close inspection, one could see the crystal also had a tiny fracture, visible as a small line between the Roman “X” and the tick mark representing “XI”—in 1967 the Rolex “Bubble Body” face only had room for the even numbers.

Jim Helton, Tom’s across the road neighbor and local jeweler, had more than once offered to replace the cracked crystal. “Tom,” he would say in his perpetually and inexplicably jubilant tone, “when ya gonna let me fix up that watch fer ya? It’s probably worth near on three or four thousand. You oughta take care of it.”

“One of these days, Jim, one of these days.”

The truth was Tom didn’t want to replace the crystal. That hairline fracture meant almost as much to Tom as the watch itself. The watch received that injury the day “Doc” Sibley took his 12 year old Tom out to the garage to show him how to change the oil in Doc’s new fire-engine red 1972 Chevy Impala convertible.

Huddled beneath the huge crimson hulk which was securely elevated by two bright orange ramps, Tom held the “trouble light” while his father ratcheted free the drain plug.
Being a new car, and this being its first oil change, the plug was putting up solid resistance. Doc lay on his back, his right hand on the wrench and left lying motionless on his chest.

Doc was just instructing his son saying, “No need paying someone to do something you can do…” when the bolt suddenly gave way, causing Doc’s typically nimble hand to lose grip of the wrench, which predictably landed smack dab on the watch crystal.

“Damn.”

It was one of the very few times Tom heard his father offer a profanity.

Doc quickly slid out from under the vehicle, carefully inspecting his watch for damage. Tom scurried out as well, “Are you OK dad?”

“I think I cracked my watch. Shoulda taken it off before we started. Oh well, what’s done is done. Let’s get back to work.” With that Doc placed the wounded watch on his workbench and crawled back under the car, placing mom’s old roasting pan beneath the drain plug to catch the oil.

That was the first day Doc had ever treated Tom like a man. He explained to Tom everything he was doing, imparting seemingly ancient masculine wisdom. Dipping your finger in the used oil to lubricate the seal on the new filter. Checking the timing using a strobe. Revving the engine by pulling on the little rod next to the carburetor. Checking, “gapping” and replacing a spark plug.

Things men must know.

In Tom’s mind that was the day he became a man. There would be many days where he would learn “man” things, but that day Tom knew his father no longer saw him as an awkward boy, he saw him as a man.

That tiny, barely visible line in that 40 year old Rolex meant everything to Tom. It meant manhood. It meant his father’s love.

At precisely 11:58pm Tom looked down at his watch and pronounced me dead. A single stab wound to the chest the obvious cause.