Current Projects - Anthologies

Why Anthologies?

There are two main reasons I decided on writing and compiling stories for anthologies. The first is that I have a number of short stories that I’ve written over the years. They need a home.

The second is that not all of my writing is in one genre or one style, so an anthology is a good way to establish the fact I write a range of genres in the readers’ minds—at least for related genres. Science fiction, fantasy and speculative fiction for example, but probably not romance. That’s a whole different animal in my mind, and a slightly different set of readers.

Thoughts on Pricing and Selling Short Stories in Anthologies.

At first I thought of packaging each short story individually and selling it for $0.99c, but I worried about the quality debate, as many readers are wary of work below a certain price range. Initially, I considered packaging the stories individually and then bundling them at a later date and selling them at $2.50, but that seemed destined to annoy and I thought it might make readers feel ripped off, especially if they’d been faithfully buying the stories one at a time only to discover I’d planned a cheaper option. Not a path I wanted to take. I thought about releasing individually and then anthologising with fifty per cent new content. It still felt wrong, so I’m going with putting my older work in themed anthologies, and then writing new stories to bring the anthology up to at least 10,000 words.

Other Reasons and Thoughts

Anthologies are a complete change of pace for me. I have trouble writing short stories. It seems I start out intending to write a short story, only to find myself with a novel or three. This is somewhat disturbing. On the other hand, short stories let me explore an idea that just won't go away, and which just won't lend itself to a novel. Of course, I inevitably end up with a novel idea coming out of it, so it has its advantages.

I started writing short stories because I was told I would never sell a novel to a publishing house or agent without being published in the magazine market first. That was one of the recommended ways to break into publishing in the early 1990's. I continued writing short stories on and off for a number of years, but only with a specific short story market in mind, and never for my own pleasure. Now I want to write them for the challenge, as they are a particularly difficult form for me to master, and because they let me play with words and pacing and story in ways that just don't suit a longer form. I hope you enjoy my experiments as much as I do.