fiction - 3 short stories that can be turned into a novel. Should I pick the one with best reviews?

I wrote 3 short stories a long time ago, and I realized there's still room to expand them. Recently I made the decision to write a novel with the purpose of starting a writing career. So my plan is to pick one of the stories and turn it into a novel (I have a tight schedule right now so I want to focus on only one).

All of them got good reviews (from people that I know and from writing communities like this one). But the one that got the best reviews was the one called Sushi Break. Which is a story about a girl who travels 3 hours every weekend to see her boyfriend (the boyfriend is doing an internship and doesn't have time visit her). Things are OK for a moment, but after some days the boyfriend starts cancelling the meetings at the last minute (usually with some lame excuse). However, the girl keeps traveling to the city to eat in a sushi place she fell in love with. In this place, she meets all kind of strange but friendly characters who help her reflect on her relationship.

Here is the story for those who are interested.

I think people liked this story because (unlike my other ones) it's quite straight forward, it has a nice imagery, and it doesn't have the kind of magical realism that I usually add to my stories. They also said that the protagonist has a "strong" voice and they can really identify with her.

Should I pick this story because is the one that is more likely to succeed (by succeeding I mean selling a good number of copies)? Or should I choose one that is closer to "my style" instead?

Answer

Should you pick a story to expand on based on which one people reviewed the best?

No you absolutely should not. What matters when picking a story to expand upon is not the reviews it's received but how well you can expand it. You should look at each story and ask yourself several questions; Where can I go with this? How can the characters develop further? Will a larger story still work well as a cohesive whole? Because surprisingly often they won't. Many stories work well in shorter form because they are short stories and thus nicely contained without any distractions from the point, they're straight forward. I've seen many writers fall into the trap of thinking that their story needs to be longer than it really does and they wind up added events and scenes that don't actually contribute to the plot or character development in any way. If Sushi Break is a story you feel you can run with and take it much further then it would be an excellent choice but if you're only considering it because of how well it did forget about it. Remember write for yourself first and worry about if anyone likes it after.