Story lenght - what would you prefer?

[Intotheworld]

I'm want to finish a story I started with a long time. Now I'm getting more active on this forum, so want to finish it so you peepz can read it aswell 🙂

BUT! The story is already about 4000 words. In my document it's 6 pages with letter size 11 in font calibri. For me that's a lot, I like long stories, but in this case I wont make it to the end in one evening because I'm a really slow reader.

What I want to know is what you prefer in the length of a story

 

[Lake Superior]

I just write until I feel like I've used all my ideas to be honest.

 

[ElFewja]

Rather than focus on or be concerned about length I would instead recommend paying attention flow, pacing and 'scenes'. Consistent flow and pacing -- basically how much of the story you want to focus on specific elements and how much you think is appropriate. As for my use of the word scenes -- I would count a scene change as tickling one foot to both, in socks and then out, switching focus on body parts or how the lee/ler is reactive. A scene change might be a break from the tickling for some word play before focusing back upon it, but, you know.

As for the narrative, again I wouldn't worry about length. Instead, ensure that you're spending an appropriate amount of time on the elements that need addressing. If some specific section feels too short or long to you, adjust it.

You can also segment the story into multiple parts if you think the narrative works better that way. I broke a single story into multiple parts recently roughly around (definitely not exactly) scene changes and kept the sections at about 1k words, give or take.

The most important part is to do what the story needs and not worry so much about the length.