Hmm, wondering...

Suppose you write a short story and get it published in some magazine. Meanwhile, you think this short is actually a great seed for a much larger piece of work, a mighty novel perhaps.

Are there legal issues that one should be wary of in such a case? Does the magazine need to be involved if you rewrite it as something bigger?

This is hypothetical, but I can see this as a potential scenario. I'm usually working on my short stories in my head long after I've put them to bed. Everytime I check on them again, they're fatter than before.

- Joel

Joel, unless the magazine has really done the dirty on you, and lured you into giving up your copyright (which you should never, ever allow) then there's nothing to stop you doing whatever you like with the material; it's your copyright. They pay you (or don't) for the right to publish it in that mag, that time, and that's it. After that, it's none of their business.

As far as a potential publisher of the novel's concerned (we can dream, dammit), the publishing credit will do you good, not harm.

Emma

Thanks Emma. I haven't had anything published in a magazine (well in truth not for 15 years) but I can dream dammit =)

I can't think of any examples off the top of my head, but I've read of lots of instances of short stories being turned into novels by their authors. Hey I just thought of one. Philip Jose Farmer's Riverworld started life as a short story and ended up as a series of several novels and (I think) a TV miniseries and computer game...

Since I posted, I spent the evening in the bath with a set of Raymond Chandler short stories which he refused to re-publish after they appeared originally in Black Mask magazine, because he'd cannibalised them (his word) for his novels. But they're now published by Penguin as Killer in the Rain. And yes, if you know the novels you can see which ones were re-worked and spliced together and expanded, and it would be a fascinating education to really study the process - he's such a craftsman.

Emma

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Mind you, they're a good bit longer than most mags would dream of publishing today - some of them must be 15-20,000 words.

Ooh the Riverworld series is brilliant, I really enjoyed it. Not read the last book yet though, so no spoilers!

Remember that whatever story you write, remains your story. I think it's perfectly possible for what you intend as a short story to become a book. My Antichrist story was intended as a 10,000 word jaunt, and then just seemed to want to unfold itself into a 120,000 word novel that then wanted to unfold itself into a trilogy complete with spin offs. Let the story take you.

JB

When you publish a short story in a mag you will have first rights but will probably be asked to sign a contract where you can't publish it again for 18 months. That will give you plenty of time to enlarge your short piece to something bigger, submit it, get it accepted (hopefully) and then get it published again but in a different format. I'd say you had nothing to worry about.

When the short story becomes reworked as a novel it becomes an entirely different piece of work - and set of words. I would think.

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So therefore, the magazine can have no claim on it, was what I meant to say. There are others who spend their entire career rewriting the one book, so it's fair game to do it with a short story.

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I meant to say 'there are writers' - not 'there are others'. Oh how I wish when we edit our posts we could just correct our mistakes, rather than adding to them.