at Central Carolina Community College yesterday whizzed by so quickly that I couldn’t believe my eyes when the clock read 3:45….gulp!
From a contemporary re-telling of a beloved fairy tale through text messages (yes!) to a memorandum from the Goddess of Chaos (hilarious!) and so much more, the contributions of all nine students simply took my breath away. And the emotions expressed struck every note on the xylophone, from laughter to tears.
What a good flash ought to do, according to Vanessa Gebbie, is to “catch you as you turn away, hold you, and when you’re finished reading, it should echo and resonate.” As the workshop leader, I can truly say that yesterday’s stories will remain with me for a very long time. It was truly an honor to be there.
We had planned to plow through six exercises but sadly, we ran out of time after the fifth. The good news is that everyone left with “homework,” so they can complete the final exercise on their own. And I’ll share it with you, just in case you want to give flash fiction a try. 🙂
Exercise 6. In the News. Choose an actual news headline and write a fictional story. (200-500 words). For example, “Chatham County Sheriff’s Office Uses Facebook to Catch Thief” or “Spring Hope Man Grows a Whopper of a Cantaloupe” (both are real examples from local news sources.)
Hint: To see how another writer probably did this, read “Local Woman Gets a Jolt,” a masterful short fiction by Jennifer Pieroni (published in New Micro: Exceptionally Short Stories, edited by James Thomas and Robert Scotellaro).
Want more? It’s not too late! Join us on Saturday, October 13, for the next installment: Flash Fiction: Revision and Publication. Now that you’ve written your flashes, you’re ready to show them off! Bring a story of your own and learn how to revise, prepare and submit it for publication in online or print magazines, and how later to create a book-length collection and find publishers.
Ashley Memory 