Crossword Genius

Book vault bare after November (7)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

novella

I'm a little stuck... Click here to teach me more about this clue!

'book vault' is the definition.
'novella' can be an answer for 'book' (I've seen this before). I'm not sure about the 'vault' bit.

'bare after november' is the wordplay.
'bare' becomes 'ella' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'after' says to put letters next to each other.
'november' becomes 'nov' (short for November).
'ella' after 'nov' is 'NOVELLA'.

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for novella that I've seen before include "piece of fiction" , "Small book" , "Short fictional piece" , "Slim work of fiction" , "Slim volume of fiction" .)

I've seen this clue in The Times.
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