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Books provide entertainment in several ways.
Once you truly recognize and realize the quality of entertainment that books can provide you through their multiple forms, I believe you won’t love watching TV or playing mobile games from thereon.
Two forms or sub-categories of books that guarantee pure entertainment are short stories and novels.
You can choose to read either one, short story or novel, and you will find delight seeping down your mind gradually.
But, what is the difference between a short story and a novel? I am sure you would be wondering now.
What makes a short story different from a novel is that you can read a short story in a single sitting whereas finishing a novel usually takes around 3-4 days.
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Novel vs Short Story
You know now the main difference when it comes to short stories vs novels so let’s dig down a little further and analyze them against each other in a direct way.
Number of Words
Since short stories can be read completely in a single sitting that makes it obvious that the number of words in a short story is less than a novel.
The typical word length range for a short story is 1000 to 4000 words. Some publishing houses have set a benchmark limit for a short story to be less than 7500 words.
However, few exceptions may have close to 15000 words, examples of such short stories are ‘The Short Happy Life Of Francis Macomber’ by Ernest Hemingway (11,188), Runaway by Alice Munro (12593).
Some fiction works have less than 1000 words but are still classified as short stories such as ‘One of these days’ by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
Novels, in contrast, have more than 50,000 words. If you’re a writer and aspiring to write a novel then you should be able to write an entertaining plot in more than 50,000 words to make it eligible as a novel.
Successful novels have a word count in the range of 70,000 to 100,000 words, that’s another helpful stat for an aspiring novelist.
Read More : Difference between novels and books
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Characteristics
Novels have a clear beginning, a middle, a climax, and an end.
Of course, turning points, action, and the development of characters follow as the plot progresses in a novel whereas modern short stories don’t introduce the setting or the main characters; they simply begin from the middle.
The limitation of the length is what encourages the short story authors to leave it to the readers to figure out the beginning of the tale or the emergence of the main character to the point when it is introduced in the story.
The short stories do have a climax, and turning points but the important characteristic to note is that short stories have inconclusive endings a lot of time.
Not every short story has an ambiguous ending but in a novel, you will barely find one.
In other words, short stories may or may not have an inconclusive ending whereas, a novel definitely has a conclusive ending.
Plot and Characters
A short story usually has one character whereas a novel has several characters, the individual events of whom weave together the entire plot.
A short story is narrated by the author from the point of view of the protagonist however, in any good novel you would find the plot presented to the readers from the point of view of different characters.
The plot in a short story runs straight towards the end whereas, in a novel, there are subplots categorized in chapters initially which converge in the main plot in the climax and thus carry the story to the end.
A novelist focuses on the development of the characters which is an inherent demand of the plot whereas, a short story writer only focuses on presenting the story of the protagonist/main character or the story from the point of view of the main character.
Read More : Difference between graphic novels and comic books
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Profoundness
A novel explores its setting, environment, and backdrop thoroughly, it tells every important detail about its characters.
You can practically visualize how the character would look or how the scene, the character is in, would look.
A novel goes wide as well as deep and is profound whereas, a short story doesn’t go as deep as a novel.
A short story barely tells all but relevant details about the character or the setting because a short story writer has to be frugal with the words.
Time Period
A short story generally lasts for a short period of time, generally from a few hours to a few days or weeks while a novel lasts for a long period of time.
I am not saying that the plot of a novel can end within a few days but that’s not the usual case. A novel’s typical plot spans months, years, or even a generation.
Read More : Difference between novels and novellas
Even from the perspective of a writer, the time taken to completely write a short story is much less than the time taken to write a novel.
A short story writer can write, edit and publish a story within a month provided he or she has the idea ready. While a novelist may take years to complete a novel.
Depending upon the theme of the novel, a novelist does months of research, comes up with several drafts, and finally, after a lot of effort produces the final version that may get accepted or rejected by the publisher.
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Analogy
Imagine if someone asks you about your life journey.
If you narrate your entire life in words in an entertaining way to that person then you can think of it as a novel, technically it will be your autobiography but this is only an analogy.
However, if you narrate some exciting and interesting anecdotes from your life that don’t take much time to narrate then you can think of them as short stories.
Short stories have an anecdotal effect. Legends, fables, parables are all forms of short stories.
Read More : What is the difference between fiction and nonfiction?
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Final Word
If you’re an amateur writer aspiring to write fiction then you must know the difference between a short story and a novel.
While the success of a writer depends on their creativity resonating with their readers but knowing the technicalities brings clarity about the product that you are writing.
As a reader of fiction, I have yet not been able to decide which one I prefer reading the most. I can say that I am a fan of both - short stories and novels, however, sometimes I choose between them according to my mood.
But I would definitely like to know which one you prefer reading the most? Do let me know in the comments section.
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