How can I make a book longer?

Question

I always use tons of details and idea, but my story always comes up realy short. How can I make it longer?

Answer 1

Imagery and details are not the way to make a book longer. They are only words that will end up red penned by your editor. Having light dance across the room won't help you make your book longer, trust me on that.

You haven't done your homework. If you had, your work would be longer. You need to do serious character studies. The more you know about people, the more you know how they will react in certain situations and the more you can write about them.

People's lives rub against other people's lives. Those become your subplots. People have pasts and dreams for the future. Those become your backstories.

Adding more words to the same story is like adding more ingredients to meat loaf. It is still just meat loaf. You cannot turn hamburger into filet mignon with more words. No matter how hard you try, more words and descriptions will not improve the quality of your work. That is an amateur way to write. It will all end up edited out anyway and you will be back to square one.

Think quality not quantity. It is possible your work is a short story or a novella. Don't pad it into a novel by adding three adjectives to every noun and an adverb to every verb. We call that "hack writing". If it isn't a novel, then it isn't a novel - no matter what you do to it. If it is a novel, your backstories and subplots are the way to keep a reader entertained and interested - not adding details like what color the sofa in Ted's living room was or what Ellen's favorite kind of soda is. Unless you have a reason for such details, they are superfluous and will be cut. However, if Ellen's favorite beverage is a rare type of soda and an empty can of that soda turns up at a murder scene - THEN that detail is important.

Only you can decide where details matter and where they are like the bread crumb filler in a meat loaf. Focus more on the "spices" and not on the tasteless filler.

I am in a metaphoric mood today, aren't I? I should be writing these down. This is good stuff.
Pax - C

Answer 2

Throw in a brand new character that shouldn't be there. It makes you think and it makes a book come to life because it isn't a character you'd imagined in the first place. Settings are great and themes and tones are great, but a new person (animal, alien, whatever), ahh, there's nothing like a new personality to break up the boredom. Good luck!

Answer 3

Use a lot of imagery and details...

For example...
Instead of... "the shadow moved across the room and startled him."

Use "The light danced across the room and the ghostly shadow loomed in the kitchen. As it grew nearer he could feel his heart beat quicken. With every second that passed it seemed to grow louder and faster, there was no way to control it."

Hope that helps :)

Answer 4

Maybe your dialog is compressed. Maybe you just write shorties--nothing wrong with that.