What passes for the website of Patrick Shawn Bagley, writer of crime fiction, horror and good ol' weird shit.
"You know what? The bastard blows me out of the water. This guy writes Maine like Ardai writes New York. If you're not reading him, you don't know what you're missing." --Chris F. Holm, author of "The Collector" series, The Killing Kind, and Red Right Hand.
"A refreshingly new voice in noir." --Ed Kurtz, author of Nothing You Can Do and The Rib From Which I Remake the World.
"A glorious boilermaker of noir and East Coast gothic. The action is taut as a sprung snare and Bagley tightens the screws with every page." -- Laird Barron, author of Swift to Chase and Blood Standard.
Friday, June 12, 2009
Here's a Question for You Readerly and Writerly Type People
The main advantages is that I already know the characters a little. If they're characters I would like to know more about, then it's a great idea.
I don't really see a downside.
Spider Robinson did this with the short story "God is an Iron," and I wasn't a big fan of the novel (forget the title), but WP Kinsella expanded the short Story, "Sholess Joe Jackson Goes to Iowa," into the terrific novel, "Shoeless Joe" (and people seem to like the movie version, "Field of Dreams."
I'm with John. Where's the problem? Unless it's a book that drags and drags and you start to say, wait a second, is someone just throwing loose meat on a winking skeleton? With quick mysteries I sometimes get that feeling, like, move it along already! Do we need a whole chapter on bar food? Or a whole chapter on the protagonist's driving skills and weight training habits? But a better question, squire: if you took first chapters of some mega cool books, do they stand alone as a group of short stories? Note to self...cool marketing anthology idea...do as a promo for a publishing house...package the anthology with a major hitter from the collection.
I've wondered this myself many a time. The only downside I can think of is that once a story is written, it's sort of cemented in my mind, and therefore might resist expanding. But other than that, I think it's a fine idea. I mean hell, good enough for Hammett and Chandler is good enough for me.
Well let's say, upon rereading one of my previously published short stories, it occured to me that the story as it existed was just the tip of the iceberg. If there's a lot more story to tell, and the ending turns out to be something completely different, you wouldn't feel dismissive toward the resulting novel? That is, if you knew it began life as a 4,000 word short.
As someone who read the short? Not at all. And if I hadn't (which the vast majority of the audience for the book would not have), I wouldn't think much about it either way. In fact, a good number of my favorite books began as short stories. I don't even fave the faintest twinge of inexplicable bias on this one.
I did that very thing and it has been challenging. The short story was on the longish side 12K words, but the first draft of the novel was 78k and the middle sagged despite the fact I added several subplots. I am now revising it yet again and I hope this will finally bring the middle portions of the novel up to par with the beginning and end.
You know I read this wrong earlier. Megan's story "Policy" for Damned Near Dead became QUEENPIN and I think it worked well. I know Michael Zadoorians short story became THE LEISURE SEEKER. So I think it does work. Just not for me.
Thanks, everybody. I've already started it, and it feels like I'm on the right course, but I have a lifelong habit of second-guessing myself. Going to stick with this thing and see if I can pull it off.
Well Patrick, my most favorite series of all time ended being seven full length novels and they all started from I believe was either a very short story or maybe even a poem. So if it is done properly then yes. I would also argue that MOST of the best book to movie conversions I have seen were from the shorter stories.
Patrick Shawn Bagley'sstories of rural mayhem have appeared in Crimespree, Spinetingler, Thrilling Detective, The Iconoclast and the Bleak House Books anthology Uncage Me (edited by Jen Jordan). He was a founding editor of The Lineup: Poems on Crime, and has an MFA from the University of Southern Maine/Stonecoast. Bagley lives and writes on a dead-end dirt road in a one-stoplight town.
Down and Out Bookswill reissue Bagley's crime novel, Bitter Water Blues, in paperback and e-book on March 19, 2018.
Bagley works at a community supports program for adults with cognitive disabilities. He is currently working on a horror novel and a new crime novel.
14 comments:
The main advantages is that I already know the characters a little. If they're characters I would like to know more about, then it's a great idea.
I don't really see a downside.
Spider Robinson did this with the short story "God is an Iron," and I wasn't a big fan of the novel (forget the title), but WP Kinsella expanded the short Story, "Sholess Joe Jackson Goes to Iowa," into the terrific novel, "Shoeless Joe" (and people seem to like the movie version, "Field of Dreams."
I thought they did a great job with the Dubus story made into, "In the Bedroom." As always I guess it depends on who gets the material.
I'm with John. Where's the problem? Unless it's a book that drags and drags and you start to say, wait a second, is someone just throwing loose meat on a winking skeleton? With quick mysteries I sometimes get that feeling, like, move it along already! Do we need a whole chapter on bar food? Or a whole chapter on the protagonist's driving skills and weight training habits? But a better question, squire: if you took first chapters of some mega cool books, do they stand alone as a group of short stories? Note to self...cool marketing anthology idea...do as a promo for a publishing house...package the anthology with a major hitter from the collection.
I've wondered this myself many a time. The only downside I can think of is that once a story is written, it's sort of cemented in my mind, and therefore might resist expanding. But other than that, I think it's a fine idea. I mean hell, good enough for Hammett and Chandler is good enough for me.
Well let's say, upon rereading one of my previously published short stories, it occured to me that the story as it existed was just the tip of the iceberg. If there's a lot more story to tell, and the ending turns out to be something completely different, you wouldn't feel dismissive toward the resulting novel? That is, if you knew it began life as a 4,000 word short.
As someone who read the short? Not at all. And if I hadn't (which the vast majority of the audience for the book would not have), I wouldn't think much about it either way. In fact, a good number of my favorite books began as short stories. I don't even fave the faintest twinge of inexplicable bias on this one.
Have. Don't even have the faintest twinge. Damn lack of proofreading.
Go for it, Patrick. If I'd read a story and heard it was becoming a novel, I'd read the novel just to see how the concept was expanded/different.
"...you wouldn't feel dismissive toward the resulting novel?"
Christ, I hope not. That's what I did with mine.
And a lot of other writers have done so, too. Sean Doolittle's The Cleanup started as a Plots With Guns story, for example.
I did that very thing and it has been challenging. The short story was on the longish side 12K words, but the first draft of the novel was 78k and the middle sagged despite the fact I added several subplots. I am now revising it yet again and I hope this will finally bring the middle portions of the novel up to par with the beginning and end.
You know I read this wrong earlier. Megan's story "Policy" for Damned Near Dead became QUEENPIN and I think it worked well. I know Michael Zadoorians short story became THE LEISURE SEEKER. So I think it does work. Just not for me.
Like I said on facebook, Amis' 'The Murderee' was pretty good but 'London Fields' was great fun. Why not go for it? I suspect you're up for it.
Thanks, everybody. I've already started it, and it feels like I'm on the right course, but I have a lifelong habit of second-guessing myself. Going to stick with this thing and see if I can pull it off.
Well Patrick, my most favorite series of all time ended being seven full length novels and they all started from I believe was either a very short story or maybe even a poem. So if it is done properly then yes. I would also argue that MOST of the best book to movie conversions I have seen were from the shorter stories.
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