Tuesday 5 February 2013

Writing Flash Fiction



I started a project at the beginning of January this year. I intended to write one piece of flash fiction every day for the whole month. I managed it and I’m now, to some extent, addicted. You can find the work at http://gillsstonesjanuary2013.blogspot.co.uk/.
I’m not sure that actually everything I wrote is flash fiction. There are, at a stretch, pieces of memoir, some philosophy and just collections of words it pleased me to put together.  But the texts are all very short and each one makes its own point.  
It wasn’t necessarily easy all of the time though it did get easier as I went along. I was constantly searching for stories. Sometimes I’d have two or three lined up. I’d then rehearse the next story over and over in my head until it was time to write it. Now I’m actually finding it impossible not to find stories everywhere.
I was never too strict about word count. The story or the needed to be the length it needed to be. It had to be short and it had to be tightly written.
I’ve enjoyed this experience and now want to make flash - fiction or otherwise – something I write regularly, though perhaps not as often as daily.  
It is a different writing experience from what I normally do – writing for children and young people. For those texts I see a film in my head which I need to get down into prose. With my very short pieces I hear a voice telling me the story. I feel a more intimate relationship with the readers and even the narrator I have created. Intriguingly the voice in each piece is entirely different.
I’m so glad I took on this project. It has been a joy.