Ann asked James V. Smith Jr.:

Do you write short stories?

James V. Smith Jr. Short answer: Nope.

But I never answer short. So . . .

The closest I come to that is the occasional chapter that feels like a complete story. I wish I were better at that. I wrote an assignment last year for the How Writers Write Fiction course and somebody commented that it felt like flash fiction. Hmmm? I didn't even know what that was. Fact is, I think writing a short story well is an art that requires reading lots of short stories and writing even more. Hard enough for me to keep learning the long form, even after I've published novels and plan to write many more.

Once upon a time I set out to become the world's greatest photographer. I got pretty good at it, but kept coming back to writing the novel. I think my patron saint, Ant Knee (I adopted him) is telling me what to do. So. Back to my next novel. But your question has inspired me to invent more short stories to populate my chapters.

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