Anne Willkomm @ FlashFiction.Net: Thoughts from a Flash Fiction Newbie

I’m new to the world of flash fiction. I’ll gladly admit it usually takes me upwards of 50,000 words to tell a story. Why? I like complicated plots with numerous characters. But I have to admit that there is something about flash fiction that intrigues me. A better way to put it might be that flash fiction challenges me in a way than novel-length does not—brevity.

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I had no idea such a form existed until part way through my first graduate class. It was a prose workshop and the professor asked us to keep a “writing journal.” It seemed kind of pointless at the time, but I found great enjoyment from the exercise. I wrote about my own issues as a writer, about plot, about character, about setting, and then I came across a piece of flash fiction—first I’d ever read. I didn’t particularly care for the piece, and don’t recall the name or author at this point, but there was an urgency to the piece that intrigued me, as did the genre, flash fiction.

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I started looking into this phenomenon. I discovered flash actually had parameters, and an even shorter version, micro—with even shorter parameters. Since that class, I have come to realize the wave of short short fiction now includes short, flash, micro, sudden, and hint—and I’m sure there are more sub-categories looming in the distance, awaiting a title. So I wrote my first piece, entitled "Abbot 1883." A mere 352 words. And while I think I managed to achieve something, some version of a story, I realized I had also failed. I failed because short short fiction, whatever title you give the form, is simply not easy to write. I did have a plot, I did have a main character, but I didn’t really develop the main character, and I gave it a shocking twist ending. A great thing for a dark and stormy Halloween reading but not necessarily for the every day flash fiction reader.

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I forgot about  "Abbot 1883" and flash fiction until recently. I’m nearing the end of my graduate studies and enrolled in a flash fiction class. And yes, I still think I work best with tens of thousands of words, but honestly, I felt writing some shorter fiction would increase my opportunities to add publishing credits to my resume.

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I came into the class thinking it would be easy. We are embarking upon week five of the class—and flash fiction is anything but easy. I constantly find my characters seem to lack proper development. In an attempt to stick to a self-prescribed 700-word limit, I leave too much in my head, because my head has conjured up some twisted plot that would otherwise take me 75,000 words to express.

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So where does that leave me, the flash fiction newbie? It leaves me with a choice, give up and run, or keep trying, rise to the challenge and find my groove with flash fiction, because I’m beginning to realize that learning and practicing flash fiction isn’t just about filling out my publishing credits—it’s making me a better writer.

About the Author

Anne Converse Willkomm began writing shortly after the death of her mother. In 2004, she was named a semi-finalist in the William Faulkner Creative Writing Competition Novel-in-Progress category for her fictionalized account of her mother's life. Later in 2006, the completed manuscript Unfinished Business was also named a semi-finalist. Her work has appeared in Sibyl Magazine and in the anthology Memoirs of Meanness. She has just completed a novel, Promises We Keep, set in Boston and the Appalachian Mountains. She is currently working on a YA adventure novel dealing with grief, The Gift. Also, Anne has written a full-length play chronicling the devastating effects of Alzheimer's—Declining. She lives in Bryn Mawr with her husband, three children, their dog, and two cats.