The Short Story Advantage

If you’re here because you clicked through from my email saying: ‘interested in writing One Story along with me, thanks! Leave a comment, letting us know why you are excited about focusing on one story, for a month, or what you’ve achieved in past challenges.

“But I want to write novels! Why do people keep trying to get me to write short stories?!”

I hear you.

I used to simply answer: “If you don’t want to write short stories, you don’t have. Go, write your novels. Be free!”

Learning About Learning

Then I watched as thousands of writers struggled to get past the 30% mark of their novels, and got discouraged.

And I went and learned a few things about how we, as humans learn.

Turns out: it’s all very well to try new things, but unless you’re able to observe the consequences of your actions, you can’t know if what you’re trying is working.

Telling a story over the course of a novel might take you months or years.

Telling a story over the course of a short story is much faster.

  • You get to see and feel what ‘idea generation’, and ‘writing a bold beginning’ and ‘getting through the middle’ and ‘managing the turn towards the end’ all feel like.
  • You begin to be able the feel a story taking shape and tell if it’s correctly proportioned.
  • You get to find experiment with different styles and genres
  • You get to find out–more often and more quickly–what readers experience when you write different types of stories, characters, endings, and language.

In short, you develop your craft skills more quickly when short stories are part of your practice because you:

  • Experiment more often and more freely,
  • Experience the consequences of those experiences for your characters, stories, and readers.
  • Can adjust course or abandon experiments more often, and try something new.

And don’t even get me started on the value of a having ‘low cost of entry’ ways for new readers to experience your writing and discover they love you; or the marketing options that open up for you if you have ‘teasers’, ‘interludes’, or ‘reader magnets’ in short form, to invite readers in or keep them interested while you’re finishing off the next novel.

You Don’t Have To Love Short Stories…

…but it’s a really great idea to incorporate them into your writing life

(There’s a reason MFA programs feature them so heavily.).

I still hate the idea of them being ‘just for practice’, but the reality is that—even though they can be so much more—they actually are really good practice in storytelling.

Fiction Is Hard, Even For Good Writers

If you’re a good writer you might have ended up in a profession that has writing as a part of it, but here’s a hard truth: it may have trained you out of being good at writing fiction.

  • If a life in journalism has stunted your ability to spin out a longer tale
  • If you’ve been away from fiction writing for a while
  • If your day job requires you to manipulate language to sell things to people, or write persuasive copy, or organize technical manuals

…coming back to fiction can be humbling. Being able to string words together in pretty sentences is only one of the skills you’ll need.

Short stories are a great way to level up in all those other skills.

Yes, you may want to write novels—you may have started or even finished a couple.

But if you are finding it slow-going, consider spending a little time with me here, in the One Story Challenge – The Whole Story Edition, coming live in September 2026.

This Is Not The StoryADay Challenge

In fact, it’s kind of the anti-StoryADay Challenge.

I’ve run this twice before, each time forcusing on a different fiction skill (“Show, Don’t Tell”, and “Mastering The Middle”).

Each time, I’ve led a group of writers through a month of bite-sized tasks that took them through the process of

  • coming up with a new story idea
  • fast-drafting a version of the story
  • sticking with it throughout the month to craft a complete story they’re proud of.

Along the way they’ve benefitted from:

  • 3-4 small lessons and prompts a week, to keep them on track
  • A community of other writers going through the process at the same time
  • Bonus writing sprints and Q&A sessions with me
  • Built-in ‘Rest and Recharge’ days every week
  • The limited container of a single month, to create just enough urgency that you get the story finished.

The Whole Story

This year the challenge is focused on ‘The Whole Story’, which means we’ll be making sure each part of the story adds up to a well-structured whole.

By the end of the month you’ll have learned a whole lot about your writing, your skills, your interests, and you’ll have proved to yourself that you can finish, and learn from writing a single story — one that is more complex than the kind of one-day Flash Fiction we often create during StoryADay May.

Sound interesting? Sign up for updates. It’s coming soon.

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Failing at Writing? Now What?

There comes a time in every writing push when it feels like you’re failing. 

Whatever goal you set, you’re not meeting it. 

You’re imperfect. And your best intentions, it turns out, aren’t enough.

If this is you, you are not alone…and I have a fix: Instead of hoping to find time for writing, you must take concrete steps to make sure writing happens.

Startitis

We start projects (stories, a novel, a challenge) with the best of intentions. 

This time, we say…This time I’ll do it perfectly. If I just work harder, I won’t have bad days.

Yeah…that’s not a thing.

When It Gets Tough

Writers aren’t machines. 

We do have to keep showing up even when it doesn’t feel easy, but to do that and stay productive, you must show up with a boatload of compassion and joy. 

That is  easier to do a, when there are fewer decisions to make and b, when you’re around other people who get it.

Not “Will I Write?” But “When Will I Write?”

I’m as allergic to being told what to do and when to do it, as the next neurodiverse/creative person.

And yet.

Writing time doesn’t just appear because we want it to.

If you’re having trouble showing up for your writing right now (looks in the mirror. Nods.) you might need to take a look at your schedule and see if you have planned time where the writing can happen.

Without a plan, it won’t happen.

Even if you plan to write on Friday afternoon but get suddenly inspired as soon as you wake up, that’s fine. Flexibility is good. 

But having a plan–even one you react against–is a powerful way to limit the number of decision you have to make in the moment, and hoard your creativity for the actual writing..

Making time for your writing a gift

… to yourself and the world. 

It’s not about creating a rigid conveyor-belt-of-words you must staff at all times. 

It is about making your writing a priority, before other people’s priorities steal all your time away from you.

So. I’m off to put some potential writing times on my calendar. How about you?

Inspiration Corner

Here are some prompts that you might have missed, this month, to get your creative wheels turning.

Days 1-9

Day 10 – Darkness to Light, from Renan Bernardo

Day 11 – Inhumanity, from Julie Duffy

Day 12 – The Visitor, from Debbie Ohi Ridpath

Day 13 – Here’s a Quarter…, from Michele Reisinger

Day 14 – Mine your Emotions, from Jluie Duffy

Day 15 – Anarchic Archetype, from Julie Duffy

Day 16 – I Think I Can, from Somto Ihueze

Keep writing,

Julie

Pick a Prompt

(Any prompt)

The StoryADay Challenge has rolled into its second week for 2026, and there’s a lively community of writers leaving comments about their writing, over at the blog.

Even if you’re not taking part in the challenge, why not read through them and commit to writing one story sparked by one, this week?

Day 1 – The Last Word, from P.A. Cornell

Day 2 – Funktionslust from Aimee Ogden

Day 3 – Ride The Wind, from Myna Chang

Day 4 – A List of Words, from Julie Duffy

Day 5 – Stranger Than Fiction, from Jared Lemus

Day 6 – Talking to Animals, from Max Delsohn

Day 7 – Dip your Toe Into Memoir, from Heidi Clausius

Day 8 – Like a Sore Thumb, from Gabrielle Johansen

Day 9 – Non Stop, from Lara Hughes

(If you’d like to get the prompts in your inbox each day for the rest of the month and aren’t already, add your email address to this form.)

Each of the prompts has some explanation and inspiration built in, so go and check them out, then leave a comment and let us know how you got on!

Keep writing,

Julie

StoryADay May Begins Tomorrow

It’s almost time!

I’m taking a moment to share some last minute details and FAQs.

  • If you have signed up for the challenge, you should start receiving writing prompts by email just after midnight (Eastern US). If you haven’t, you can sign up here.
  • If you haven’t been through the prep tasks, don’t fret. You can dip into them any time you get stuck, to shake things up. Find them all here.
  • Each day, you should read the prompt and decide if you want to play with it or write something completely different. Try to start and finish a story every day that you’re writing. (If you ‘miss’ a day, don’t try to catch up. Just keep showing up.)
  • Come back to the prompt when you’ve written and leave us a comment, letting us know how it went. Don’t post your story, but do feel free to share a line you loved or tell us what you learned.

Something New

A couple of years ago I provided an optional Challenge Handbook, with daily warm up and brainstorming exercises, tailored to each prompt and I’m doing it again this year.

Here’s what people have said about these exercises:

  • “The brainstorm exercise in the Handbook rocketed me directly into a draft of the story (thanks, Julie!)”
  • The Warm-Up helps me get the page “dirty”….
  • The Brainstorming page is where a lot of my ideas are generated. If I already have an idea, then it helps me flesh out my plan…

This year the Handbook is available as a private podcast with written transcripts. It’s just a dollar a day during the challenge, with the option to donate more if you like. (The price will go up in June.)

StoryADay Challenge Handbook logo

Get the StoryADay Challenge Handbook for 2026 – custom warm-up and brainstorming exercises for every prompt, delivered as a private podcast with transcripts.
SUBSCRIBE NOW

Get The Handbook

It’s time: sharpen your pencils, straighten your notebooks, get some sleep, and I’ll see you in the comments tomorrow!!

Keep writing,

Julie (signed)

Day 30 | Granting Wishes by Julie Duffy

The Prompt

You did it! Now let’s see if your character has THEIR wish granted…

Grant your character’s deepest wish, today

You’ve done it!

You started this month with the desire to write more, write better, and build your writing practice.

With commitment (and probably some imperfect execution) you’ve arrived here, at Day 31 of StoryADay. That’s a huge accomplishment.

As you write your story today, think about how it feels to get what you wanted.

Of course, reality never quite matches up with how we imagined the perfect outcome (for example, I imagined that this year I wouldn’t crave Sundays ‘off’ from my own challenge. This did not turn out to be true…)

For your character, feel free to use the old fairy-tale caution to be careful what you wish for.

For yourself, however, I’d remind you that achievements begin with two things: a vision of how things could be; and a decision to work towards that better future. You used both to write, this month.

CELEBRATE!
Whether you wrote three stories or 31, you Imagined yourself as a writer, you Wrote, you Refined your practice, you Improved your craft, you Triumphed and, if you’re still reading this, I’m pretty sure you Engaged with the community.

You’re living the I, WRITER life.

If you’d like to keep Repeating this successful pattern, take the next steps by joining our on-going community, the StoryADay Superstars. Find out more.


Tomorrow, I’ll be back in your email inboxes one final time, related to StoryADay May 2025, to send you a self-assessment form, so you can capture what went well and what you will do differently as a result of everything you’ve learned on this journey.

This is one of the most valuable documents you’ll create for yourself and I recommend repeating the practice after every project, in future.

For now, sit back and bask in the your successes as a StoryADay 2025 Winner!

Julie Duffy

Julie Duffy
In 2010 Julie was a frustrated writer, who decided that writing a StoryADay in May would be a great way to kickstart her writing practice. 16 years later, it seems she was right. The rest of the writing world quickly caught on and now May is known as Short Story Month! Julie is the author of writing handbooks, articles, podcasts, workshops and courses, as well as a short story writer, and ‘Book Boss’ — your accountability coach for getting to ‘the end’.

If you’d like to spend six months in the writing community Julie created, consider joining our StoryADay Superstars group.

Join the discussion: what will you do with today’s prompt OR how did it go? Need support? Post here!

Remember: I don’t recommend posting your story in the comments here (and I talk more about why not, here). Best practice: Leave us a comment about how it went, or share your favorite line from your story.

31

Here’s your next Game Piece. save the image and share on social media with #storyaday

Prefer paper crafts? Here’s the cut & paste version