Today, I invite you to embrace some playfulness and boldness in your flash. Your prompt:
Write the same ONE paragraph story THREE TIMES. Keep repeating the same elements, but change something in each version that takes the story in a new direction. See how this changes the overall arc from the first to the last story. See how you can create a sense of movement and rising tension simply by moving things around. Do not be afraid to get a bit strange or surreal in this. Keep subverting the reader’s expectations.
An example is my own “Three Likely Stories” which was published in The Forge Literary Magazine.
If you need a nudge, here are some words/images you might incorporate:
Kathy Fish has been writing, teaching, and editing flash fiction for over 20 years. She has published five collections of short fiction, most recently Wild Life: Collected Works from 2003-2018. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in Ploughshares, Copper Nickel, Washington Square Review, and numerous other journals, textbooks, and anthologies. Fish’s widely anthologized “Collective Nouns for Humans in the Wild,” was selected for Best American Nonrequired Reading 2018 and the current edition of The Norton Reader. She is the recipient of a Ragdale Foundation Fellowship and a Copper Nickel Editors’ Prize. Her free monthly newsletter, The Art of Flash Fiction, includes a craft article and writing prompt. Subscribe at artofflashfiction.com .
View all posts by Kathy Fish
2 thoughts on “Bonus Unexpected Sabbatical: March 23”
I’ve enjoyed all of these prompts and keep coming back to them. I read the Three Likely Stories and wow, love it. Thanks for sharing!
I’ve enjoyed all of these prompts and keep coming back to them. I read the Three Likely Stories and wow, love it. Thanks for sharing!
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Thanks so much, Susan! And thanks for reading Three Likely Stories!
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