I recently submitted a short story to a steampunk anthology. It’s just under 5,000 words and a fun little gadgety/Lovecraft/adventure thing. I think that it’s good etiquette to give the editor time to respond before sending it to someone else, right?

So, being anxious about hearing back got me thinking: What exactly does one do with a short story?

Submitting it to a magazine or anthology is pretty standard. You could also write a bunch of them and collect them in a book. If you have a novel, maybe think about writing a related short story and including it as a free bonus in a deluxe eBook?

But I’m thinking about me here. The story has been submitted, I don’t have enough for a collection, and I don’t have a novel.

Okay then, what about a free giveaway for fans? Sign up for my email list and get a free short story? What about a free short story to tide the fans over between your novels?

Again, I don’t have a novel and people don’t come to me looking for stories so I don’t know if my music people would care. I do like the idea of giving away content to attract readers/listeners but if I gave away one short story, what would the goal be? Just to be nice? To get people interested in my other writing that may be a long time in coming?

What if I tried to sell it? One short story for, say, $0.99 when other writers are giving away novels? That doesn’t seem to feel right.

Oh, wait! I’m a musician. I do sound stuff, right? What if I record an audio version? I’m sure I could do something cool with that. It’ll take me a little while to get that together so maybe I’ll hear about the submission by the time I’m done.

But what would I do with an audio recording of a short story? $0.99? Free download if you sign up for my email list? Maybe I should shut up and write the next story.

This is all very confusing.