The shortest story I’ve ever written, it came out of nowhere, and took half an hour to write. Not exactly my SOP. It’s on Wizzley, and I won’t be posting it anywhere else because Wizzley doesn’t want to see duplicate material. I will be writing a number of articles there on the subject of imprisonment and other human rights issues, so I posted the story there as a kind of introduction.
A Precarious Freedom. About 700 words. More a sketch than a short story, really, of a prison inmate who’s just been released from solitary confinement.
Audrey Kalman
/ February 25, 2013I liked the story. Well, maybe liked is the wrong word–”was impressed by,” “felt moved by”–because how can one “like” something so devastating?
By the way, you have just written a piece of flash fiction. It’s a fun genre, and one that I have just started to explore. It contains all the elements of a longer piece–plot, character development, story arc–condensed into one tiny little package. A challenge!
Catana
/ February 25, 2013The irony is that I don’t even like flash fiction, as a general rule. Maybe it’s because most of the stories I’ve come across read as if the length was more important than the content. I prefer to let stories be as long as they need to be, so if one wants to be that short once in a while, I’ll let it. I just want the story to work. Your reaction says this one did. Thanks.
Audrey Kalman
/ February 26, 2013I absolutely agree about letting the story dictate length (and even form). But it can be fun to play with the challenge of trying to find a story that wants to be told in a particular form.