This fall two new pieces of “small fiction” of mine were published by KYSO Flash, in Edition #6. Very happy to share these with the world! “Marcus” was born of a writing prompt of “crass,” so, just letting you know… I combined it with the voice of a character I dreamed of, one of those nights when I doze off around 3 am.
The other story, “Carried and Missed,” is a case of condensing. I have about 200 pages written about the narrator of this story, and I’ve sliced her out of my novel in progress. Perhaps she will get her own book. At the moment, I am interested in seeing if I can condense several of her episodes into flash. (Hmm, maybe I should try for a novel in flash — I saw a contest for “flash novels” of up to 7000 words with 10-15 chapters, recently.)
One thing I think about a lot is how to make flash sufficiently evocative to carry a punch in a small package yet surprising and fresh. I find that there is economy in using some familiar tropes, so people can quickly fill in the background, especially when writing stories of say 20 words or less. Yet I want to avoid cliche. I am not entirely sure I succeeded in avoiding cliche in “Carried and Missed,” at least as regards the affair. But I hope the other imagery in the piece lands true.
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