THE DEBATE: IS A SHORT STORY TRULY HARDER TO WRITE THAN A NOVEL? by Gigi Pandian

Gigi: When Jenn learned that my first short story collection was coming out this week, she said, “short stories terrify me!” That got me thinking, why do so many mystery writers fear short stories? They’re such fun! But it’s also true, for the longest time I had no idea how to write one. I had successfully finished writing a novel before I was able to write a good short story. 

JENN: It's true! They do terrify me. Break it down for me, Gigi!

As a reader, I love short stories—you do too, don’t you?—but writing them? I wasn’t sure how to pull it off—until I realized my short story superpower. What clicked for me was that I’ve always adored locked-room mystery stories, the classic puzzle plot stories where it looks like the crime itself is truly impossible. Those puzzles are perfectly suited to the short story form. By keeping a locked-room mystery short, the reader can read it all in one sitting and remember the string of complex clues pointing to the solution and have a satisfying “aha!” moment at the end. I knew if I was going to write a good short story, I should write what I loved: a locked-room mystery.

Locked-room mysteries—also known as impossible crime stories or miracle problems—center around a satisfying puzzle that’s hidden in plain sight, and often with the clues pointing like a supernatural solution is the only possible explanation—think of the TV show Jonathan Creek and Golden Age mystery novels and stories by writers like John Dickson Carr and Clayton Rawson. (Any other Jonathan Creek fans reading? I adored that show!)

Once I’d worked out a twist that would be the solution of the seemingly impossible crime, the rest of my first story flowed out of me. One afternoon at the San Francisco Public Library, I began writing the Jaya Jones story longhand in a paper notebook. I couldn’t stop writing, and I gave myself a hand cramp, but I finished a full draft of the story! While my agent was pitching my first novel to publishers, and I submitted my story to an anthology competition, and a locked-room mystery short story became my first publication. 

That method of writing a short story is what I still follow today—I find my twist that solves a seemingly impossible crime, then ask my characters what would be an interesting way to get there. It can take a long time to work out a clever twist to make such a story successful (I’ve got a few ideas that I’ve been trying to work out for longer than it takes to write a novel), but once the story solution clicks, the process gets easier. 

Because I love to be fooled by clever puzzles steeped in a mysterious atmosphere, I want to give readers the same experience. I’m having a ball writing stories in between novels, and I’ve been thrilled that readers are enjoying them—“The Library Ghost of Tanglewood Inn” won an Agatha earlier this year (eep!), and I’m even more excited about my new novelette that leads this collection of stories: “The Cambodian Curse,” a Jaya Jones story with multiple locked-room mysteries. 

Readers: If you aren’t already a fan of this genre, you’re in for a treat if you pick up a locked-room mystery collection from the Golden Age of detective fiction or one of the many new ones! For a starter list, my Goodreads page has a locked-room mystery list with 100 novels and short story collections. 

And writers: If you want to try writing a short story but don’t know where to begin because it’s so different from a novel, my advice is look at what it is about your favorite short stories you love. Once your particular spin on stories clicks for you, I bet you’ll begin having as much fun as I am. 

Do you have a favorite short story? Or have you thought about writing one but haven’t tried yet? (And seriously, Jonathan Creek fans, I want to hear from you! I dearly miss that show and think it’s time to watch it again.) 

I’m giving away a copy not of the book itself, but something you can’t buy – a comic-style zine of illustrations inspired by the stories in the collection, drawn by my artist mom! I’ll draw a winner a week from today from one of the commenters. 

THE CAMBODIAN CURSE & OTHER STORIES includes nine locked-room mysteries, plus an introduction from Laurie R. King and a foreword from impossible crime mystery historian Douglas G. Greene. Appearing here for the first time is novelette The Cambodian Curse:  When an ancient and supposedly cursed Cambodian sculpture disappears from an impenetrable museum, and the carving’s owner is killed by an invisible assailant while a witness is a few feet away, historian Jaya Jones and her old nemesis Henry North team up to solve the baffling crime. 

Gigi Pandian is a USA Todaybestselling and Agatha and Lefty Award-winning mystery author, breast cancer survivor, and accidental almost-vegan. The child of cultural anthropologists from New Mexico and the southern tip of India, she spent her childhood traveling around the world on their research trips, and now lives outside San Francisco with her husband and a gargoyle who watches over the garden. Gigi writes the Jaya Jones Treasure Hunt mysteries, Accidental Alchemist mysteries, and locked-room mystery short stories.

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