: Re: How can I make a story bigger? I have written a first draft of what I want to be a novel -- aiming for 50-70K words. When the ending arrived I was at about 30K. So I essentially have

@Murphy332

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Composition rule #13 : Omit needless words.

Whereas Strunk was referring to sentence structure, I believe this applies to overall word count. Adding content in a story just to make it bigger is literary bra stuffing. Keep in mind that "Of Mice and Men" is commonly published at around 100 pages and it stands as one of Steinbeck's more potent works.

However, if you feel the need to expand it because the content feels thin, consider Orson Scott Card's treatment of his short story "Ender's Game." He decided to expand it to novel length as a precursor to Speaker for the Dead. To do so, he had to begin the novel years before the short story. He also added the plots of Ender's siblings and their activities on "the nets." By doing so, he did not dilute the content of the story but rather enhanced it.

I recommend never adding to a story just to make it longer. Though I love Les Miserables and consider it a brilliant novel, I still find Hugo's diversion into the history of the battles of Waterloo difficult to get through. Something you could try is adding content and letting someone read it. If they get bored with it and put it down at those added parts, try again. In Bag of Bones, Stephen King wrote several pages about Mike Noonan's volunteer work when he was experiencing writer's block. His wife hated it and asked why Stephen had to bore the reader with pages of content that doesn't relate to the story. He cut it out and made it better.

Another rule I've remembered in writing this: Second draft = first draft - 10%. Sometimes you need to add stuff but the rule of thumb should be taking stuff out.

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