Comments on Blog Fiction: Short Posts or Long Posts

>>if ANY web-based fiction ever manages to find a ...

2009-05-11T12:43:09.274-04:00

>>if ANY web-based fiction ever manages to find a wide audience, and maybe even crossover to print (as some non-fiction blogs have)- it'll be blog fiction.

I'm hoping so too!

I had been wondering when chatting with my readers...

2009-05-09T21:33:25.087-04:00

I had been wondering when chatting with my readers (all 3 of them) why they hadn't arrived at the conclusions I had been hoping they would've. I think you hit the nail on the head when you said: "If you're stringing together a lot of events, readers may forget certain details." I plan on using my travelers "who" contacts page to offer summaries of the main characters.
Two of my many self afflicting challenges are to write 400 words for every post and update twice a week. When I was updating every day I could only manage about 200 words. I have been thinking of updating once a week with perhaps 800-1000 words. Any advice is more than appreciated so thanks so much for your posts and comments.

600-1,000 words seems to be the optimum length for...

2009-05-08T18:03:36.877-04:00

600-1,000 words seems to be the optimum length for a blog fiction post. Bsically, as you have said, you are looking at the equivalent of three pages from a book.

I find I ask myself this question a lot, maybe eve...

2009-05-08T12:33:31.163-04:00

I find I ask myself this question a lot, maybe even more than the question deserves...

With Flyover City, the central conceit of the thing is that it IS this one guy's blog - I can't imagine tackling it as a straight forward "novel" (a movie or indy comic book, maybe) Different people write different length posts in their "real life", and at the end of the day you have to meet the needs of your story, so I think the bigger thing is -

(1) making the posts as blog-like as possible ("So, last night..." or "Right now, I'm sitting in my cubicle...", etc. - especially if you want it to be a "real" BLOG fiction.)

(2) immediacy: trying to present the events in some sembalance of REAL time. (Which is a big, HUGE trick for me. I have enough trouble living ONE life in real time!)

"reading on the computer is a universally hated activity" - TOTALLY agree w/ Ryan on this, which is why I think if ANY web-based fiction ever manages to find a wide audience, and maybe even crossover to print (as some non-fiction blogs have)- it'll be blog fiction.

At least, I'm hoping so... ; )

I started writing my blog-fiction with a general w...

2009-05-08T10:06:53.916-04:00

I started writing my blog-fiction with a general writing edict of 1,000 words/day. So, generally, my fiction posts go to that length (and beyond if I'm feelin' it). I'm an avid reader, so don't mind the long post (if it holds my interest). Conversely, reading on the computer is a universally hated activity.

I guess I lean towards write according to your writing plan and worry less about the ease or acceptability of length. If you're writing SEO-based blog posts about [enter hot topic here], then short is king. But with fiction, it's inherently 'lengthy,' not the E! news network.