I’ve always been fond of novellas or rather I’ve always been fond of short books. It was only when I started blogging, I began to read novellas. π But what is the attraction of a novella compared to a full length novel?
Convenience. My reading can be quite uneven. Hence reading chunksters such as Crime and Punishment or Nicholas Nickleby may easily take months, making me forget events and characters early in the book as I go along. This doesn’t happen with novellas. Also, they are less intimidating and suitable for a flight or a long train ride.
Focused Writing. I tend to get annoyed when parts of a book feel like pointless filling without any significance for the story. I would always prefer to read a shorter book, where every part adds value. For me that is another attraction of novellas. Typically, there isn’t room for too much mucking about aimlessly in such a short book.
Impact. When a novella is well done, it may have a relatively strong impact, because the story is so compact and intense. There is something compelling about being able to leave this world completely in a few hours and get a fully fledged and satisfying story. Also, I think it’s an art in itself to write engaging characters and a good plot in relatively few pages.
Suitable playground. I’ve started to appreciate playfulness with form and structure in books more than I used to. But depending on how alternative the format is, it may be too much for a full length novel. A novella is the perfect playground.
I’ve been reading lots of short books in 2021, but using a cut-off point of 200 pages, only four of them qualifies as novellas.
The Sense of an Ending is in my view an example of perfect utilisation of the novella formal. In 150 short pages, Barnes builds a clever, impactful and perfectly rounded story. The central theme is introduced in the opening chapter and everything which follows links to that central theme. The climatic ending points back to the starting point, making the plot line circular. I didn’t enjoy all the content, but for structure this novella gets top-marks from me. Winner of the Booker Prize 2011.
Assembly is written in a modern stream-of-consciousness style and it also plays around with the format on the page. In my opinion it wasn’t quite successful. When finishing I had the feeling I sometimes get with short stories: Was that it? So even if I mostly enjoyed the content, I didn’t feel, it managed the art of delivering a satisfying story in the relatively short novella format. However, had it been much longer, I may have started to find the writing style a bit testing. Shortlisted for the Goldsmiths Prize 2021.
In The Employees the experimentation pays off. Written as a series of ultra-short, non-chronological employee interviews, where we don’t know who is speaking or whether the employee in question is human or humanoid, this story shouldn’t work. And yet, it was one of the most impactful books I’ve read for a while. It was creative, philosophical, emotional and illustrates perfectly how punchy a novella can be. Shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2021.
With Cove it isn’t just convenient, but almost necessary to read the story in one sitting. With his minimalistic, poetic prose, Jones makes every word count. The novella is filled with symbolic meaning and the fragmented, ambiguous writing flows in an out between reality and imagination, present and past. Unless you read it over a relatively short time-span I don’t think you get the full impact. You need to remember the prologue clearly, when you reach the end and you need the continuity to appreciate the brilliance of the writing. Cove is a great example of all the four points I mentioned above regarding novellas.
Do you like novellas? For which reasons? And do you have any good recommendations?
This post was inspired by Novellas in November hosted by Cathy and Bookish Beck.
I love long novels and the idea of losing yourself in a story for a long time. But I’ve been reading many short stories in the past couple of years, and I’m more and more in love with the format, for many of the reasons you state here. The art of compacting characters and their stories in such a short format, while keeping everything impactful, is probably what fascinates me the most!
I was really intrigued by The Employees, so I’ll definitely check it out!
As for recommendations, The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories, by Ken Liu, is a collection I read earlier this year that completely overwhelmed me. Liu’s writing style is very beautiful, gut wrenching and almost humble in a certain way. I still think about some of those stories daily. Perfect if you like speculative fiction, with some sci-fi and fantasy thrown in the mix!
I do see what you mean about losing yourself in a long story. When finding the right one, I do love that as well. But on average I prefer shorter novels. Not necessarily novellas, but relatively short books. If you enjoy alternative formats and writing, The Employees may be worth looking into. It has elements of sci-fi, but it isn’t really genre fiction.
Thanks for the recommendation! I’ve heard of Ken Liu, but haven’t read any of his works. Will definitely look into The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories. It sounds like something, I might enjoy.
I rarely read novellas, and yet I often enjoy them when I do, for the reasons you’ve mentioned. But there is something satisfying about being immersed in a longer tale which takes its time to resolve. Luckily, we don’t have to choose. The right book for the right moment works for me!
The right book for the right moment sounds like the perfect approach to me! In periods of my life, where I have more time to dedicate to reading, I am more open towards picking up longer novels. Whereas when I have less time, a novella seems more suitable.
Good plan.
π I thought so.
Great post! Agreed about “chunksters.” You can only read so much of them before you need to break it up with something else. What has your favorite-ever novella been?
Thanks! π I don’t think, I have a favourite novella as such, but Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto, which I read last year, made a huge impression. I’ve always had a soft spot for Japanese authors. Quite often they transport me into this dreamlike or otherworldly state-of-mind, which I haven’t experienced much with other authors.
Oooh, I’ll have to check it out! π
It may not be in your taste, but you should have a look! And if you don’t like it, at least it’s short! π
I normally prefer novels, but — A Cup of Tea by Amy Ephron and The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett are both amazing. Both are beautifully written and I think you would like them for the reasons you’ve mentioned in your post.
Yeah, maybe I am in minority, preferring relatively short books. Thanks for the recommendations! I really enjoyed Alan Bennett’s The Lady in the Van, so The Uncommon Reader is a great suggestion. Will look into A Cup of Tea as well, not familiar with the author.
I prefer short books too. I donβt have the patience anymore to deal with tomes. I recently read a good, breezy, short book: Sleeping Murder, by Agatha Christie.
I like Sleeping Murder as well. Agatha Christie is a good example of an author, who understands how to write a tight plot without any unnecessary filler content.
I don’t read novellas too often but I totally get how they would be like a breath of fresh air between two large and weighty books π also, I love experimenting with form, so I probably ought to check out some more novellas if it’s more prevalent there!
From the comments it seems not everyone is as keen on novellas as I am. But yes, they work well as a palate cleanser between two longer novels. I don’t know if it’s a coincidence, but I have read quite a few novellas (or short novels) which were quite experimental.
I guess it’s easier to experiment in a shorter format as it might get a little tiring to write (and read) that in a longer one. I’ll definitely be looking into that more!
Yes, that is a good point. The exception is of course Ducks, Newburyport, which is a 1030 pages novel written in one sentence!
What?! Damn, that sounds really difficult to read!
I know! I am not even going to try! π
Interesting post! π I still want to read The Employees. I’m not sure how a novella is defined exactly but I like them because (hopefully) they cut straight to the story without too much waffle.
Thanks! π I hadn’t heard of the concept of a novella before I started my blog. But apparently it is defined as a work of fiction between 10,000 and 40,000 words. It seems we like novellas for the same reason.
I love novellas and have read quite many over the years. Early in my blog I wrote a post on favourite novellas and I have a tag for novellas. I am reading one now, and this week’s Monday Musings is going to focus on them. One of my many favourites is Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Chronicle of a death foretold, but we have some great Aussie ones too, like David Malouf’s Fly away Peter.
I am glad to have met another novella fan! Thanks for the recommendation, I have been meaning to read some of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s works and a novella seems like a good place to start to get an impression of his writing.
Thanks for this post! I loved The Employees too.
I am glad to be able to contribute to Novellas in November! Since I love novellas it felt very apt and I enjoyed writing the post. π
Novellas are the perfect length. I love them too β€οΈ
They really are the perfect length – glad you agree! π
I love a good novella, but a really good short story can be even better!
I have had more mixed experience with short stories. I suppose it’s even more difficult to write a satisfactory story in short story format and I often feel they finish just as they were getting started. I do have a few favourites though such as The Birds and The Yellow Wallpaper.
OMG… The Yellow Wallpaper… !!!
I know!!
I’ve really just discovered novella’s and short stories this year and am loving them. I’m amazed at how engaged I feel with characters in just a few short chapters – the stories of Jane Gardam I think are amazing, amongst others.
I am glad you have discovered novellas and short stories! I think they have something different to offer and sometimes you are in the mood for something short. Never heard of Jane Gardam, but her stories seem to have very high ratings on Goodreads.
They’re well worth reading, quite quirky
Ooh, I like quirky!
Great points! I love novellas too although I sometimes happened to read it without knowing it was a novella LOL Main reason being, like you mentioned – focused writing. No wasted words. Write simply but powerfully and purposefully.
Thanks! Haha, I don’t normally know if I read a novella or novel. It was only when I prepared this post that I bothered to look at the actual page numbers for the books I’ve read this year.
It’s definitely an art to write with no wasted words. I wish more authors managed that specific art!
I like novellas, too. Theyβre so much fun to read!
Exactly, they are fun and not too time consuming!
I have a hard time with most short stories, but I don’t mind reading novels, whatever their length, rather short or long! Pascal Garnier is a remarkable author of novellas – noir genre
I have had mixed experiences with short stories as well, but novellas seems to be the perfect length for me. Of course it all depends on the book and the author in question. Some stories seem to require a lot more pages to tell than others. I like noir and will definitely look into Pascal Garnier.
I’m using novellas to expand my reading comfort zone. If a book is long I want to be fairly sure that I will enjoy it, but I’m much braver with novellas. If something sounds intriguing but somewhat intimidating, perhaps written by an author from a country I don’t normally read much from, I’m often able to convince myself to risk as long as it is less than 200 pages.
That is a great way to use novellas. I guess, I am braver with novella as well exactly for the reasons you list. Maybe, if I learned to DNF, I would be more experimental with longer books as well, but knowing that I normally finish the whole thing, it makes more sense to take chances with short books.