Now that the trauma of a home sale, home purchase, and big move is behind me, I can find time to write again. But, writing a novel can be a slog. Ask anyone who has tried it. Sometimes the mind just shuts down. The muse flies back to her mountaintop.
In an effort to trick the muse into returning, I decided to try my hand at some short and short-short fiction. Flash, if you will. I didn’t really realize how difficult short works can be until I applied strict word counts to each attempt. 7,000 to 12,000-word short stories are not too difficult. An engaging beginning, an interesting middle that moves the story along, and a snappy ending are all possible, and for me, quite doable at this length. However, once you enter the realm of 2,000 words or less, the difficulty factor ramps up a bit.
In flash fiction, the flowery descriptions of scenes, the finite details of combat, the lengthy monologues, and internalizations once used to enhance a storyline are too large to include and leave room for the shortened plotline. Every word must count for more than one thing. Every sentence must perform multiple functions.
My first attempts received mixed reviews. A friend from my writer’s group suggested I try poetry. She is quite accomplished, and I take her advice seriously. However, poetry and I do not seem to mix well. After a few pitiful attempts, I returned to editing with a microscope and a scalpel. It was a brutal process. I truly learned what the phrase, kill your darlings means. Any word that was not multi-tasking or absolutely necessary to create comprehensive sentences was quickly deleted.
One project was a 2,000-word short story to submit to a competition at the Lakefly Writer’s Conference in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, this spring. It took much longer than planned, and I missed the submission date. The original story was around 3750 words. I made the cuts to get it to 1,998 words!!! The good news is that I was able to submit a flash piece of around 700 words. We’ll see how that fares.
The bottom line is that this process taught me that word choice and thoughtful editing significantly impact the final piece. Additionally, I can successfully write shorter works. The good news is that the muse has returned, and work on the second novel has resumed.
Tales From The Hare 