Serial fantasy fiction at Paths of Adventure
Filed under Writing Journal on April 28, 2009
Tagged: fantasy fiction, flash fiction, serial fiction
Serial and flash fiction are popular formats among online markets like Mindflights or Laser & Sword. The short length makes them an easy read on a web page, and in the case of serials, a natural hook to draw traffic back to the site time and again.
I’ve toyed with the idea of publishing fantasy fiction on Pens & Swords in serial or flash format. I prefer writing novels, and stray to short stories when a story idea that can be portrayed in less than 10,000 words won’t get out of my head. Writing serial and flash fiction provide a means to exercise skills that a writer can use in longer formats, however. Every novelist should know how to end their chapters with killer cliffhangers, a staple of the classic serial. Flash fiction helps a writer learn how to hone their craft to an economy of words that still conveys their ideas with impact.
Fiction I publish on Pens & Swords will be limited to excerpts of projects I’m working on or pieces I’ve sold, for the time being. Serial and flash fiction are formats I’m not interested in pursuing for publication on a regular basis, so that translates to no recurring fiction feature on this blog.
My new blog Paths of Adventure is another matter. One of the reasons I started this new blog was to record the play sessions of the 4E game I’m currently playing in, but a dry, mechanics-based report didn’t interest me. So, I decided to take a page from my experiment with play-by-post roleplaying and fictionalize the game.
Yes, I suppose the result technically qualifies as fan fiction. There will be references to the names of places, people, and things taken from published game material. The protagonists are all original, however, and much of the copyrighted material bears only a surface resemblance to how it will be used in the game. We won’t be furthering the storylines of any iconic characters or plots. I’m not making excuses, I’m setting expectations. This isn’t an exploration of stories I might have written if Wizards of the Coast had chosen to continue our relationship.
I’ll publish a new episode every Monday, assuming no interruption in the game. The first two episodes are already posted. I’m trying to limit myself to 500 words. The first episode ran a little long, the second was a bit short. I hope you enjoy them.
