What Is Flash Fiction and Why Should You Care?

© 2019 Sharon Rene

Flash fiction is a short story under 1,000 words. Sounds simple right? I’ve had six stories published in Splickety/Spark Magazine and writing flash fiction is fun, challenging, and a great way to learn your craft, but it is not easy.

Flash fiction gave me my first publication credits, so I encourage every author out there to give it a try. But don’t take my word about the benefits. James Scott Bell says that flash fiction causes you to use your plotting, characterization, and editing muscles in a concentrated way.

According to a famous tale about Ernest Hemmingway, he and a few other authors were having lunch when Hemmingway boasted that he could write a short story in six words. They all laughed, but he bet them ten dollars, took a napkin, and wrote these six words: For sale, baby shoes, never worn. The writers gave Hemmingway the money. That may have been the first flash fiction ever written.

All of my flash fiction has been written for the Splickety Publishing Group. Guidelines and theme lists are available on their website. Each monthly issue has a theme which inspires me to dream up stories. Fortunately, Splickety is a Christian owned magazine, so I don’t have to worry about unsavory content.

Here are hard and fast editing rules for flash fiction, many of which apply to all writing. The major difference is that in a book of eighty thousand words you can get away with more mistakes than you can in a story of one thousand words.

  1. Remember the biggie rule we have all heard: Show don’t tell.
  2. Stick to one point of view.
  3. Make sure something is at stake in the story, or it won’t be interesting.
  4. Keep story cohesive—beginning, middle, end
  5. Write events in the order they happened.
  6. Check for problem endings—abrupt stop, no real conclusion.
  7. Avoid “filtering” words (examples, heard, looked, saw, smelled, thought, felt, knew, wondered, realized, noticed).
  8. Don’t overdo dialogue tags (primarily use said when you need a tag).
  9. Vary sentence length and structure.
  10. Don’t use much backstory.
  11. Look out for weak modifiers—especially –ly adverbs.

Now that you’ve learned the basics, grab a pen, start writing, and have fun!

NOTE: Splickety/Spark Magazine closed at the end of 2018, but Havok has stepped up to take its place in the flash fiction arena. They are actively seeking submissions now.
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Sharon Rene writes Christian fiction. Her children’s book, A Mixed Bag of God’s Grace (available in paperback and Kindle), was released May 2018 by TouchPoint Press. She has also published a collection of flash fiction stories, A Flash of Romance, which is available on Kindle. She’d love for you to connect with her on her website to learn more about her Divine Destiny Young Adult series and through her newsletter Your Dream—Your Destiny.