I intended to write about short-story writing... and instead I wrote a minimalist short story which wasn't even the kind of story I had in mind when I started the post - if you see what I mean.  Never mind if you don't. Forget what I've written so far. Lets start again.
Prompted by a friend, today I have been wondering if I have been avoiding writing what I might weel be best at - short stories. Certainly some of the longer posts here, fleshed out and polished, could stand as short stories in theri own right. I have many more, both 'imaginary' and "real" that are too long for blog treatment. And Low Life Games, the novel I have written is about half the length I expected it to be, but exactly the length I think it should be.

In other words, my talent might be as a short story writer than a novelist. I am (at the moment, anyway) intimidated by big themes, complex narratives and above all large scale denouments.

Yet I felt a great pressure, as a potential fiction writer to aspire to be a novelist - preferably on a grand scale.

Of course, there are sound ecomonic reasons for this. Few people buy books of short stories, even written by well-known names, And although there are magazine and journal outlets for short stories, competition to get published in them is fierce.

But, things are changing. Is there aany future for printed-on-paper fiction, anyway? If new forms emerge, aren't they more likely to be suited to short forms rather than long forms?

...Or not. What's most importnant is that I think that, once I got through a lifetime's habit of prejudice against the short story, I might immensely enjoy writing them