Flash Fiction Chronicles

by Bonnie ZoBell

Abigail Beckel and Kathleen Rooney (shown right and left respectively in the photo) of the highly-respected Rose Metal Press are interviewed at Flash Fiction Chronicles today.

Abigail Beckel (Cofounder and Publisher) has worked professionally in publishing for more than eleven years at publishing houses such as Pearson Education, Beacon Press, and Blackwell Publishing, and for the magazine Physicians Practice. She is a published poet and received her MA in Publishing and Writing from Emerson College.

Kathleen Rooney (Cofounder and Editor) is the author, most recently, of the novel-in-poems Robinson Alone, released in fall 2012 by Gold Wake Press. She is also the author of the essay collection For You, For You I Am Trilling These Songs (Counterpoint, 2010) and the memoir Live Nude Girl: My Life as an Object  (U of Arkansas Press, 2009), as well as Reading with Oprah: The Book Club That Changed America (U of Arkansas Press, 2008). Her poetry collection, Oneiromance (an epithalamion), won the 2007 Gatewood Prize from the feminist publisher Switchback Books, and her collaborative collection with Elisa Gabbert, That Tiny Insane Voluptuousness, was published by Otoliths in 2008. Her debut novel, O, Democracy!, is forthcoming with Fifth Star Press in 2014.

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Bonnie ZoBell:  Hello, Abby and Kathleen. I appreciate your participating in this interview since Rose Metal Press is one of the best fiction chapbook publishers out there.  

Abby Beckel and Kathleen Rooney:  Thank you! We appreciate you interviewing us and appreciate the compliment about our flash fiction chapbooks.

 BZ:  Does Rose Metal Press have a philosophy?

AB and KR: We founded Rose Metal Press in January of 2006 as an independent, 501(c)(3), nonprofit publisher whose mission is to produce books in what we call hybrid genres, by which we mean short-short stories, prose poetry, flash nonfiction, novels-in-verse, book-length linked narrative poems, image and text collaborations and other literary works that move beyond the traditional genres of poetry, fiction, and essay to find new forms of expression.

 BZ:  What would you say your press is looking for in the way of submissions?

 AB and KR:  We’re looking for work that is formally adventurous and, for lack of a better word, “experimental” because we like those two simultaneous effects: the pleasure of the form itself in addition to the content and the invitation to the reader to be challenged (and hopefully rewarded).

That being said, we do not look for work that seems bizarrely structured merely for the sake of being able to call itself “hybrid.” We seek work whose hybridity feels both exciting and essential—because while the form is a big component of what a reader is supposed to be getting out of their experience of a Rose Metal Press work, so too do we want the reader to feel that the work has an emotional impact and truth.

 BZ:  What mistakes do you see writers making who submit to Rose Metal Press?

AB and KR: Sometimes we get submissions from people who seem to think that “hybrid genre” means “chaotic mess” or “anything goes” or “clean out your drafts folders,” and that’s not really what we are looking for.

We also get a lot of queries and submissions from people writing traditional books of poetry and prose. That’s great, but it’s not right for us. Our advice to writers is to always take the time to read the submissions guidelines and general mission of a press or journal before submitting. It saves everyone time and the process will be much more fruitful for you!

 BZ:  What’s your idea of a perfect submission?

 AB and KR: We want work whose hybridity, though it may be surprising and innovative, feels purposeful, considered, well crafted, and essential: in other words, we can’t imagine the work taking any other form than the hybrid form they’ve presented. We also want work that has ideas and heart.

BZ:  Name a few writers whose chapbooks Rose Metal Press has published and tell us a few words about their chapbooks.

 AB and KR: Our most recent chapbook, Shampoo Horns by Aaron Teel, is a collection of linked stories set in a Texas trailer park and is a meditation on boyhood, brotherhood, and the fragmented process of coming of age. The one before that, Betty Superman by Tiff Holland, is based on Holland’s relationship with her mother, a story arc all its own, only Betty isn’t her mother and Holland’s not the narrator, not completely. We like both fiction and nonfiction, and these two most recent ones have blurred the edges between those genres. The one before that, We Know What We Are by Mary Hamilton was more lyrical, and even though the pieces were decisively flash fictions, they came close, in many cases, to being prose poems.

We’ve just announced the winner of this year’s contest, chosen by judge Deb Olin Unferth: Kim Henderson’s The Kind of Girl. The stories in this chapbook explore the way girls and women are defined and confined—by themselves, someone else, or their environment. It’s a restless book, full of tragedy, beauty, and resilience. The Kind of Girl will be available this August.

BZ:  If you could put a fold-out in one of your chapbooks, who or what would it be of?

AB and KR: If we were able to do foldouts, we can think of lots of cool options, like a foldout string of paper dolls representing all the kinds of girls Kim Henderson illuminates in The Kind of Girl, or French fold front covers with extra space to letterpress great dialogue lines from the book.

 BZ: Talk a little about the production of Rose Metal Press’s chapbooks. 

 AB and KR: The page range is 25-40 pages in manuscript form, and then that varies in the finished product depending on the design and the trim size. Our longest is 64 pages, but most are around 44-52 pages. Each year, our amazing head designer Rebecca Saraceno decides on a different trim size and interior design based on the “feel and tone” of the stories. We have the interiors printed offset, but print the covers by hand on an old Vandercook letterpress at the Museum of Printing in North Andover, Massachusetts. It’s a wonderful couple of days where the 3 of us wear aprons, pull the type, set the type, and crank each cover out by hand. We usually use two colors on the chapbook covers so all 400 copies have to go through the printer twice. We then choose specialty endpapers and deliver the covers and endpapers to the interior printer (Red Sun Press in Jamaica Plain, Mass.) and they saddle-stitch and trim them for us. Because of the special, time-consuming process we use, we only print 300-400 copies for each chapbook, so they are considered a limited edition item. All of our chapbooks are now sold out on our site except for last year’s Shampoo Horns. We’ve reprinted several of them in our anthologies of 4-5 collected chapbooks, A Peculiar Feeling of Restlessness and They Could No Longer Contain Themselves.

 BZ:  Do you accept manuscripts all year round, or only during certain times of the year?

 AB and KR: Only during certain times of the year. We always run our annual Short-Short Chapbook Contest from November 1 through December 1 of every year. We generally have an open reading period for hybrid genre manuscripts every other spring. We have one this year from April 1 to May 1. (Details here http://www.rosemetalpress.com/Submit/Submit.html)

 BZ: Is Rose Metal Press interested in chapbooks from new writers who haven’t had books or chapbooks published before?

 AB and KR:  Yes. We’re open to manuscripts by both established and emerging writers. Quality is the first consideration and all of our contest submissions are read blind.

 BZ:  How many stories in the chapbooks submitted to you do you like to see already published? 

 AB and KR:  It depends. We’ve published some chapbooks where the author had only published a few stories individually before submitting the whole manuscript to us, and others where a large number of the stories had already appeared in print and online. We do like to see authors getting their work out there and building a readership, but again, quality is the first consideration.

  BZ:  Would you like to add any other advice or tips to writers trying to get their fiction chapbooks published?

 AB and KR: Three quick tips:

• Research! Try to familiarize yourself not just with the guidelines, but also with the aesthetics of the presses you submit your work to.

• Put one of the best stories in the collection as the first story. During a contest reading period, the reviewers and judge are reading a lot of manuscripts, so you want a strong hook to keep them reading.

• Pay attention to the overall arc of your book, even if your stories are not linked. A manuscript that is well crafted and organized feels purposeful to the reviewers and offers more of a feeling of resolution. If you just print out all your stories and clip them together, that feeling of haphazardness can carry over to the reviewers.

 BZ:  Thanks very much for all this information on fiction chapbooks, Abby and Kathleen. This will be a big help to a lot of writers.

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Bonnie ZoBell’s fiction chapbook The Whack-Job Girls with Monkey Puzzle Press was released in March 2013 and her short story collection WHAT HAPPENED HERE is forthcoming with Press 53 in spring 2014. She’s received an NEA fellowship for her fiction, teaches at San Diego Mesa College, and is Associate Editor of The Northville Review. For more information, visit www.bonniezobell.com.

by Jim Harrington 

I’ve been posting quotes about writing on my Facebook page for a while. They come from articles and books I read. What I don’t mention when I post a quote is whether I agree with the comment or not. Nor do I reply to someone else’s remark. They’re offering their opinion, and I don’t want to discourage that. After one post, Randall Brown shared a quote he received from another Facebook user almost simultaneously with mine. Here they are in the order received.

View procrastinating simply as part of your creative process. That you’re not really avoiding writing so much as thinking about it, shaping it in your head, crystalizing it, before you actually sit down to do it. -Michael Geffner 

Planning to write is not writing. Outlining, researching, talking to people about what you’re doing, none of that is writing. Writing is writing. -E. L. Doctorow

Well, isn’t this interesting. You can’t get any further apart in an opinion than these two quotes. And, in this case, I disagree with both comments.

I don’t like the use of “procrastinating” in the first one. To me, procrastinating is doing something totally different to avoid a task. For example, instead of sitting my butt in the chair and working on a WIP, I decide the lawn needs mowing, or the leaves need raking, or the toilets need cleaning. On the other hand, I do a lot of “writing” while taking a shower or driving to an appointment. It’s during these times when I let various plot lines compete with each other in my mind. These lulls also provide the opportunity to help me develop characters. I may have a conversation with one, or perhaps I eavesdrop while two of them have a conversation. My mind can process these interactions much faster than my fingers can. Heck, I “wrote” the first draft of this post while walking my dog.

Writing quotes are great for making me think about my writing process. Sometimes they provide the kick in the pants I need. Other times, I find they simply don’t work for me. I need to think through most of my stories and give them time to ferment. Often, I need to simplify the task by eliminating part of the process (e. g., typing, which I’m no speed demon at). What works for me may not work for you and vice versa. Just as we’re individuals in our beliefs and mannerisms, we all accomplish the task of creating a story in our own way. And there’s nothing wrong with that. I don’t put words to screen every day. I do think about writing every day. Is my output the same as someone who writes every day? Of course not. Does it matter? Not to me. My main goal has never been to make a living writing, nor do I need a story to appear online every month. Some writers do, and there’s nothing wrong with that.

Given the opposing views in the quotes above, some readers might think it’s not helpful to read about writing if all it’s going to do is create confusion and angst. So, is reading articles and books on writing a bad thing? No. Read about writing as much as you can, but don’t take everything you read as gospel, even if the advice comes from your writing idol. Don’t simply dismiss a comment you don’t like either. Chew on the comment. Digest it. Assimilate that which improves your writing, and let someone else worry about the rest. You’ll be a better writer, and your readers will notice.

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Jim Harrington began writing fiction in 2007 and has agonized over the form ever since. His stories have appeared in Every Day Fiction, Liquid Imagination, Ink Sweat and Tears, Near to the Knuckle, Flashes in the Dark, and others.  He serves as the Interim Managing Editor for Flash Fiction Chronicles (http://www.everydayfiction.com/flashfictionblog/).   Jim’s Six Questions For . . . blog (http://sixquestionsfor.blogspot.com/) provides editors and publishers a place to “tell it like it is.”  You can read more of his stories at http://jpharrington.blogspot.com.

by Jim Harrington 

Markets Added

• Ekto Magazine (500-1000, quarterly) Open to most fiction – visit site
• In Posse Review (1000, unknown) Open to most fiction and poetry – visit site, view guidelines

Editor Interview Added

• Conium Review, The (1500, biannual) Literary fiction and poetry – visit site, view guidelines

______________________

Jim Harrington began writing fiction in 2007 and has agonized over the form ever since. His stories have appeared in Every Day Fiction, Liquid Imagination, Ink Sweat and Tears,  Near to the Knuckle, Flashes in the Dark, and others. He serves as the Interim Managing Editor for Flash Fiction Chronicles (http://www.everydayfiction.com/flashfictionblog/). Jim’s Six Questions For . . . blog (http://sixquestionsfor.blogspot.com/) provides editors and publishers a place to “tell it like it is.” You can read more of his stories at http://jpharrington.blogspot.com.

by Thomas Kearnes

“Never Be Ashamed of Your Subject, or Your Passion for Your Subject.”
–Joyce Carol Oates

This quote is from a brief essay called “To a Young Writer.” I read this essay whenever I experience self-doubt about my career, my talent or my peers’ true opinion of my work. I think we all have little pick-me-up quotes from authors we admire to get us through the down times. Here’s why Oates’s quote has been such a lifesaver for me…

As I’ve freely admitted in prior columns, I’ve developed a sort of reputation for writing about the seamier side of life, gay life in particular. Lots of sex and lots of drugs, and while I do have passionate opinions about both, I wouldn’t call either one my true “subject.” No, that would be emotional disconnection and the desperate things it drives people to do. Even my first short stories and flash, written well before I turned 30, dealt with this theme.

If you ever feel yourself adrift creatively, unsure what you should next write “about,” revisit your older works (both published and unclaimed) and see if you can find a connecting thread. My first stint in rehab over a decade ago gleaned me hardly anything of merit, but my counselor did once make the observation that most artists say the same thing over and over again. At the time (I was only 24) I was deeply offended. Twelve years later, however, I take a certain pride in this astute observation.

…revisit your older works (both published and unclaimed) and see if you can find a connecting thread.

I do believe that most people in this world (particularly the gay men I’ve met) are disconnected from not only the world as a whole but also, far more tragically, from the other men who share their passion for the same gender. Most of these men use sex and/or drugs to hide their loneliness, but it never works. At least, not for very long.

So…what do you believe about the world? What is your philosophy? I wouldn’t recommend this kind of self-examination until you have at least a few dozen stories to study. If you’re that early in your career, you should be focusing on gaining skills, improving your technique and boosting your imagination. Once you’ve achieved a certain level of reliable competency, however, pause and consider what all your previous works have been trying to say. If you still believe your themes to be utterly essential to understanding life on this earth, then keep writing about them. Anything you write that doesn’t incorporate them on some level may turn out contrived or forced.

Once you’ve achieved a certain level of reliable competency, however, pause and consider what all your previous works have been trying to say.

What’s to keep your storytelling fresh if you repeatedly visit the same thematic well? For starters, make sure each protagonist and situation you create is in some way unique from anything you’ve written before. Also, make sure you don’t rely on the same material to express your themes too often. Recently, for instance, an editor who overall liked a story I sent ultimately rejected it because he felt I had once again depended on a protagonist’s sexual behavior to provide insight into his personality. I’m not sure I necessarily agree with his analysis of that given story, but I’ve made it one of my goals this year to write more stories with either no sexual content or to handle such content more discreetly.

If you’re fortunate enough to still have your work read 100 or 200 years from now, consider what you’ve said about life (as you know it) through your fiction, and if you’ve written your stories with enough skill and courage, that message will come bursting forth regardless of whatever surface trappings each individual story employs. If you want to guarantee your work will suffer a quick demise, doubt yourself, and allow peers or editors to decide what stories you tell. Fear kills more writing careers than a lack of “talent” ever will.

As I prepare for the publication of my first short-story collection (“Pretend I’m Not Here”), I’ve started giving thought to how I’ll answer questions about my work when interviewed. Given my love of ambiguous endings and characters, I have no doubt I’ll be asked at least once “What are you trying to say to your readers?”

I’d like to say we’re only as lonely as we choose to be.

What are you trying to say in your work and how fiercely would you fight for the privilege of continuing to say it?

_______________________________________

Thomas Kearnes is a 35-year-old author from East Texas. He is an atheist and an Eagle Scout.
His flash has appeared in PANK, Storyglossia, Night Train, SmokeLong Quarterly, Word Riot,
JMWW Journal, wigleaf, The Pedestal, Knee-Jerk, LITnIMAGE, 3 AM Magazine, Thieves
Jargon, Underground Voices, Prick of the Spindle and elsewhere. Two of his flash stories, “Girl
with Donkey” and “Shame,” have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. He can be reached at
trkearnes@yahoo.com.

by Rumjhum Biswas

 Girija Tropp lives in Melbourne, Australia. She was raised by Indian parents in Africa. Girija’s short fiction has been published in Agni, Boston Review, Best Australian Stories (2005 and 2006), Southword, Sleepingfish, Fiction International, Mississippi Review (prose poem issue), Denver Quarterly, Re:al, Boston Review,Zoetrope All-Story Extra, a Visible Ink anthology  and elsewhere; and forthcoming in Diagram (all-fiction issue); microfiction and online fiction at Snow*Vigate, SmokeLong Quarterly, Elimae, Margin, and Cafe Irreal; amongst others. She was a finalist in the Faulkner Awards for the Novel 2006 and winner of the Josephine Ulrick Literature Award 2006. She is completing a novel, polishing up new short fiction, and raising her children while juggling the demands of working in multimedia and as part-owner of a food manufacturing company.

Rumjhum Biswas:  You are a very prolific writer, and have been published since the early days of online literature. Can you tell us about your writing experiences from those days?

 Girija Tropp:  I have never considered myself prolific — I see myself more as magpie or forager. The early days were, well, early days. My writing community was formed from those days. I wrote like there was some place to go. I thought I knew more than I did.

RB:   You have been published in some of the finest magazines online and in print. What, according to you, separates a great piece of fiction from something that is good but obviously not excellent?

GT:  The writer’s own ability to move gracefully through emotional states is reflected in their work. However since we are flawed, an awareness of the self, without the need to be any other way, also comes through in the prose and this, more than anything else, is characteristic of fiction I would consider excellent.

RB:   Can you tell us about your early influences as a writer? Which writers inspired you?

GT:  I had no mentors. This is more about me than the existence of great writers. The act of writing was something I did just like waking up each day.

RB:  When did you discover you were a writer? Can you tell us something about your early days as a writer?

GT:  I think I was nine. I used to write in exercise books in classrooms, hiding the opus underneath textbooks for whatever subject was being taught.

I had no mentors. This is more about me than the existence of great writers.

RB:   You have written a lot of flash fiction. What according to you are the right ingredients for a great piece of flash?

GT:  Serendipity.

RB:   We’d like to know more about you – the person behind those stories. How do you juggle being a mom and writer and handle a job etc.?

GT:  I am usually entranced by whatever is in front of me. If I do not like what is in front of me then I meditate on the meaning of existence. I am also very fanatical about my levels of well-being; currently excited by the effects of light and colour and other such intoxicants on brain function.

RB: Please give us a glimpse of a typical writing day in your life.

GT:  I am writing a lot on my iPad. I spent a lot of time learning to sync with my desktop, and while I have not perfected the art form of writing wherever, I have learned a lot. I don’t write every day. I used to. Sometimes, I spend all day writing, or weeks. I write best when the sun is out.

RB:   You were raised in Africa by Indian parents and now live in Melbourne. How have the different cultures and locales impacted your work? Can you give us a few examples through your stories? And links if any.

GT:  The sense of having arrived from an alien planet and wishing to communicate with the inhabitants is always with me. Most obvious in stories like “Cellular“, or more recently in “Theatre“.

I write best when the sun is out.

RB:  What are you working on now?

GT:  Putting in the small flourishes to yet another completed novel and this has taken me so long that I completed a short story a few months ago, and was happy to note that I still had it in me!

RB:   What is the shortest piece of flash fiction that you’ve written?  There are many lengths – including one that is six words long, which is your preferred length for a flash fiction?

GT:   I do not produce ultra short fiction and I would have a hard time finding a contender for the shortest. 300 to 500 words would be my cup of tea.

  _______________________________________

Rumjhum K Biswas has been published all over the world and has won prizes for her poery and fiction, including first prize in the 2012 Anam Cara Short Story Contest. Lifi Publications India is publishing her novel Culling Mynahs and Crows and also her book of short fiction The Vanishing Man and Other Imperfect Men this year.

by Jim Harrington 

In a post on the FFC New & Emerging Writers Group on Facebook, Gay Degani asked readers to share how they chose the names of their characters. There were a few responses that got me thinking about this. However, before I get to my conclusions, I’d like you all to participate in a short exercise. Pencils ready?

Below are three first names. After reading each one, jot down three things you know about the characters simply based on these names. Don’t think too much about your responses. Don’t skip ahead. Don’t look at the answers of the person sitting next to you. You won’t receive a grade, nor are there any wrong answers. Here’s the list. I’ll enjoy a sip of tea or two until you get back.

• Bobbi Jo
• Chuck
• Mai Li

***

Okay, here are my responses.

• Bobbi Jo — perky, teenager from the southern U.S.
• Chuck—athletic, tall, muscular
• Mai Li—Asian, female, slim build

I’m sure your responses differ from mine. The point is that, just as when we hear an unfamiliar voice on the phone, a name creates an impression with the reader. The question becomes does the impression the reader has about the character match what the author intended? Of course, authors can add some description to paint a clearer picture.

Bobbi Jo hunched over a bowl of soup at the table to my right. She reminded me of  a walrus resting on an iceberg, it’s tail hanging in the water.

Oh my. What happened to my perky teen? With the added description, I haven’t created any tension for either character. But what have I done to the reader’s expectations? Made her curious enough to keep reading, I hope.

Flash fiction is about brevity. When writing a 300-500 word story, we don’t have the word count to write detailed descriptions of every character (not that there should be many in such a short piece). Maybe the author can accomplish this in a few words, or perhaps all that’s needed is a well-chosen name that creates a picture of the character in the reader’s mind.

On the other hand, as with my description of Bobbi Jo, I can create the opposite impression in my reader by having the character act in a way that is in direct contrast to the reader’s impression of a character—an impression formed by assumptions made based on knowing the character’s first name.

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Jim Harrington began writing fiction in 2007 and has agonized over the form ever since. He serves as Co-editor/Flash Markets Editor for Flash Fiction Chronicles. Jim’s Six Questions For . . . blog provides editors and publishers a place to “tell it like it is.” You can read his stories at http://jpharrington.blogspot.com.

by Rumjhum Biswas

  Abha Iyengar is an internationally published poet, author and creative writing mentor. Her work has appeared in Pure Slush, Bewildering Stories, Danse Macabre,Muse India, New Asian Writing  and others. Her story, ‘The High Stool” was nominated for the Story South Million Writers Award (2007). She co-produced a poem-film, ‘Parwaaz’ (2008) which won the Special Jury prize in Patras, Greece. She was the Lavanya Sankaran  Writing  Fellow at the Sangam Residency(2009-10).

Abha is a certified Creative Writing Mentor from the British Council. Her published works are “Yearnings” (poetry), “Flash Bites” a collection of her flash fiction and her fantasy novel “Shrayan”. Read more at her website: www.abhaiyengar.com  and  Blog: http://www.abhaencounter.blogspot.com

‘There is promise and light in concrete

Opportunity in glass’ ~Abha Iyengar

Rumjhum Biswas:  When did the writing bug bite you and what happened next?

Abha Iyengar: On September 11, 2001, when the Twin Towers fell, I was in the middle of writing my first story to be sent online for a writing competition. So I remember the time well. This was the start of my online writing contributions. Before that, in the non-virtual space, I had published a few poems in Femina, won a Haiku writing competition, but these were flash-in-the-pan things. I was not very encouraged by the desultory response of the Indian magazines and journals till the internet bug bit me. International literary journals snapped up my writing and now I have this rash of writing that never leaves me ever since the bug bit. Thank you, Internet Writing Bug.

RB:  Did anyone mentor you or encourage your writing as a child?

AI: My father bought us books by the dozen. My mother never insisted we do household chores so I spent my time reading and day-dreaming. And of course, we borrowed and swapped with friends and did whatever was required to get our hands on books and comics. I grew up in Calcutta (now Kolkata), which has literature coming out of its pores like breath. We received beautiful books as prizes at my school there, and I won many. I read Lorna Doone and A Tale of Two Cities in class 5. In class 7, I had this very smart, short-haired teacher of English who wore hipster cotton saris and smoked cigarettes, and she  loved my essays (e.g. ‘Autobiography of an Old Shoe’). We kind of worshipped each other. I think I realized then that I could write.

I do not believe, however, that any one writer has influenced me or that I have wanted to style my writing after anyone. I think all my reading leads to my writing.

RB:   Tell us about the writers who inspired you when you were young?  Who are the writers you feel you have learned from/influenced your writing?

AI:  Younger days I loved Enid Blyton, Agatha Christie, P.G. Wodehouse, Arthur Conan Doyle, Guy de Maupassant, Premchand. At age 13, I read Harper Lee. I could not get over Scott and Atticus Finch and Boo Radley. Then there was a spate of Leon Uris, James Hadley Chase, Harold Robbins, Arthur Hailey, John Grisham, a novel a night.

Saadat Hasan Manto and Ismat Chugtai, I read later, and I think their kind of radical, truthful and hard-hitting writing is the kind of writing I always want to do. Neil Gaiman is a favourite and so is Paolo Bacigalupi. Angela Carter. Elif Shafak. Khaled Hosseini. Closer to home and recently, Jerry Pinto. The writers whose work I enjoy are too many. I do not believe, however, that any one writer has influenced me or that I have wanted to style my writing after anyone. I think all my reading leads to my writing.

Flash is all about jumping in. You need to jump into the story, into the action.

RB:  You love flash fiction and have published a book of flash stories apart from your many publications. Tell us about your journey into this form.

AI:  Flash was all the rage online at the time I began writing and still is. My first flash ‘Tunnel Vision’ got accepted at Insolent Rudder. My writing was called ‘visceral’ by the editor (a compliment I have not forgotten) and after that there was no looking back.

I find writing flash is the easiest and best thing for me. Also, if there is any labour in it, I don’t feel it, it is totally a labour of love.

RB:  What is a typical writing day for you like?

AI:  I grab the day by its shoulders and try to write as much as I can. The thing is that the best ideas come to me when I am going to bed, and then I have to pen the thoughts down, for they never come back. So I scribble something half-asleep and then try to decipher it next morning and am amazed at what I have written. I do not remember those visitations in the morning.

E- publishing is the best thing that has happened to writers. Writers don’t have to wait anymore to be discovered by traditional publishing houses.

RB:  In the workshops that you conduct for fiction and poetry, what is the most common drawback that you find among your students?  What advice do you generally give to aspiring writers, especially for flash fiction?

AI:  Some students are self-conscious and hesitant. The word ‘I can’t’ is often on their lips. That changes when they realize that they actually can write. The shattering of inhibitions occurs in my writing class.

Flash is all about jumping in. You need to jump into the story, into the action. You don’t have the time nor space to use too many words. Also, there is a plot, a story line. For me, the title is of grave importance, for where words are scarce, the title can hold a lot of meaning. The last sentence has to be a kicker. It should be the final punch that makes everything fall…into place.

RB:   Tell us about your experience with e-publishing. Do you think this is what is best for flash fiction books?

AI:  E- publishing is the best thing that has happened to writers. Writers don’t have to wait anymore to be discovered by traditional publishing houses. The huge time benefit is there, apart from everything else. It is a good thing not only for flash fiction books but for all books.

I send myself long messages as I travel in an auto etc. Sometimes I lose my way because I concentrate more on the writing than on where the auto-driver is taking me. Or he bills me too much. But a story on the move is worth it, isn’t it? You lose some to win some.

RB:  What flash fiction genres do you enjoy reading and of course writing most?

AI:  Weird. Funny. Black. Touching. Not really genres, but there you are. Slot as you will.

RB:  Is there a flash fiction genre that is more popular than others? Do you agree? What do you think?

AI:  Yes.  Flash takes very well to weird and surreal. I am so clued on to that.

RB:   What is the shortest flash piece that you ever wrote? How did it challenge you?

AI:  I wrote a 50 word story called “The Masterpiece” for Blink Ink’s Special Noir print issue of September 2011. No challenge. I love cutting out the excess, trimming the story to size. For me it is a very expressive mode.

RB:   Do you have a special place for writing? What do you do when inspiration strikes you? Are you one of those always-carry-a-notepad-and-pen writers?

AI:  My laptop looks for a fine, flat surface to sit on, I look for some quiet in the environment, and voila, we are in business. I do have a desk, and it usually works as the flat surface. I work from home, so when everyone leaves for the office, I get my quiet time. Of course, I have to choose to ignore the doorbell and other such sundry intrusions.

I am one of those carry-your-mobile-on-the-fly writers. The tech-savvy kind. I send myself long messages as I travel in an auto etc. Sometimes I lose my way because I concentrate more on the writing than on where the auto-driver is taking me. Or he bills me too much. But a story on the move is worth it, isn’t it? You lose some to win some.

RB:   What are you working on now? Any plans for a second volume of flash?

AI:  Most recently, I have a story featured at Flash Frontier.  There are, of course, all  kinds of collections that are to happen: flash, short stories, poems. A novel. Nothing is ever enough. The Bug is insistent.

Read more works by Abha Iyengar at:

• www.abhaiyengar.com
• ‘SHRAYAN‘ an adult fantasy novel at Amazon Kindle:
• ” Flash Bites” a flash fiction e-collection on Amazon Kindle, BibliocracyE,  and smashwords
• ‘Yearnings‘, a poetry collection

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Rumjhum K Biswas has been published all over the world and has won prizes for her poery and fiction, including first prize in the 2012 Anam Cara Short Story Contest. Lifi Publications India is publishing her novel Culling Mynahs and Crows and also her book of short fiction The Vanishing Man and Other Imperfect Men this year.

by Jim Harrington 

Today I thought I’d tackle that age old question “Who Am I?” Doh. Sorry, wrong question. I just returned from therapy session number 1,436 (and one half), where I found out I’m no closer to answering that question than I was. . .well. . .1,436 (and one half) sessions ago. No, the question I want to address today is “What is Flash Fiction?”

According to Pam Casto’s chapter in The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction, “[f]lash fiction is difficult if not impossible to define—and should be allowed to remain so—because this type of writing is protean.” In his article in the same book, Bruce Holland Rogers quotes Kate Wilhelm as saying, “… a novel invites the reader to explore an entire house, down to snooping in the closets; a short story requires that the reader stand outside of an open window to observe what’s going on in a single room; and a short short requires the reader to kneel outside of a locked room and peer in through the keyhole.” As for Rogers, he feels “… the essence of flash fiction is in how I experience it as a reader and working writer.” Jason Gurley adds “…flash fiction is a short form of storytelling. Defining it by the number of words or sentences or even pages required to tell a story, however, is impossible, for it differs from writer to writer, editor to editor.” I like Randall Brown’s definition of flash as “a very tiny thing that doesn’t want to be anything else.”

As you can see, there’s little consensus when it comes to flash, and most proponents of the form don’t seem to mind. Perhaps a satisfactory way to define flash is to paraphrase U. S. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart and say it’s hard to define, but we know it when we see it. (Stewart’s original comment was in regard to pornography.)

Not only can’t people reach a conclusion as to what flash fiction is, they can’t decide what it should be called. Short-short stories, sudden fiction, postcard fiction, quick fiction, skinny fiction, and micro fiction are just a few of the designators used.

Determining the proper length for flash fiction is also elusive. Some magazines allow stories up to 1500 words. Most of the journals I submit to limit stories to no more than 1000 words. MicroHorror limits the word count to 666! Hint fiction are stories of twenty-five words or less. Twiction—or Twitter fiction—is 140 characters long (including spaces, numbers, and punctuation). You’ll also find Dribbles (50 words) and Drabbles (100 words). Ernest Hemingway penned a six-word story to win a bet.

“For sale: baby shoes, never worn.”

Here are two other six-word stories from Wired Magazine’s 6-word science fiction stories.

 Longed for him. Got him. Shit.—Margaret Atwood

Failed SAT. Lost scholarship. Invented rocket.—William Shatner

In October of 2009, The Vestal Review began a new feature called the “Dirty Dozen”. These are stories of exactly twelve words—plus one for the title.

Examples are:

Respect

It was always about her face, until she turned and walked away. (Ben Loory)

***

Bitter

He blustered into my life like winter’s outburst. I blew him back. (Becky Povich)

***

 Dominatrix

She drinks to get in the mood. He drinks to survive it. (Alan Stewart Carl)

Are these really stories? That’s up to the reader to decide.

One thing I do know is that writing is writing, whether the end result is an 800 word short-short or an 80,000 word novel. Both are hard work, and both require rewriting, rewriting, and more rewriting.

I participated in a discussion at The Flash Factory on Zoetrope about how long it takes to write flash. Two interesting ideas resulted: 1) Experienced flash writers can—and often do—write stories in a flash, and 2) The length of time it takes to complete a story isn’t important. To paraphrase something I read online, “It’s the story, stupid.” Flash requires that every word counts. I can’t think of any stories I’ve written where every word was correct the first time, or second, or third. Can flash be written quickly? Sure. Does it work that way for every story? It doesn’t for me.

Hmm… It appears that I’ve had no more luck defining flash fiction than I have answering the question “Who Am I?” I’ll keep trying with the former. As for the latter, maybe I can Google it.

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Jim Harrington began writing fiction in 2007 and has agonized over the form ever since. He serves as Co-editor/Flash Markets Editor for Flash Fiction Chronicles. Jim’s Six Questions For . . . blog provides editors and publishers a place to “tell it like it is.” You can read his stories at http://jpharrington.blogspot.com.

Susan Tepper writes fiction, poetry, interviews and essays. She is the author of four published books. Her current title “From the Umberplatzen” is a quirky love story set in Germany and told in linked-flash-fiction. Tepper has received 9 nominations for the Pushcart Prize. Her novel “What May Have Been” was co-authored with Gary Percesepe (Cervena Barva Press, 2010) and nominated for a Pulitzer. www.susantepper.com

Susan Tepper grew up on Long Islandwhere both her current books take place. What May Have Been: Letters of Jackson Pollock & Dori G is set in The Hamptons, home of the artist Jackson Pollock. In Tepper’s collection Deer & Other Stories, most of the stories are set on Long Island, or have a strong connection to The Island.

Before settling down to study writing, Tepper was an actor, flight attendant, marketing manager, tour guide, singer, television producer, interior decorator, rescue worker and more.

Rumjhum Biswas:  Reviewers of your work have called you a master of the short short fiction form, and a writer of spare prose who makes every word count. What is it about flash fiction that draws you?

Susan Tepper:  Rumjhum, you started with an intriguing question.  I’m actually drawn to longer fiction, as well, having written three full length novels (as of yet still unpublished).   For years I was the queen of the forty page short story.  But the ‘demographics’ for the short story began changing, and the magazines, with limited print space kept giving less and less space for stories.  The hand-writing, as they say, was on the wall.  Plus attention spans were changing in the culture.  I try and stay current as a writer.  But I think I picked up on the short form as an almost unconscious way of  assuring my survival.  I like getting published.  And there were many more opportunities for shorter fiction in the past five or so years.  I read it in the journals, and began to write it.  I seem to have gotten the knack.  I also think that being an economical type of poet has helped me to shape the fictional short form.

RB:  “From the Umberplatzen” is a novella that has effectively used the flash fiction form in its narration. Can you tell us about the inspirations and challenges during the writing process?

ST:  This question, or a variant, has come up before and I always sort of shudder and worry about what to say.  You see, I didn’t consciously sit down to write a novella in flash.  I just sat down one day and wrote one flash fiction.  Within it, the made up word Umberplatzen was born.  I’m the kind of writer who puts down one word and then the next, with no idea where the hell I’m going.  When that first story was done, I sent it out to Marcus Speh who published it in his kaffe inkatmandu.  I was so extremely happy!  Plus Marcus gave it a beautiful illustration to go along.  So I wrote another one.  A companion story which he also published.  And I was hooked.   I’m like a cat.  Stroke me and feed me, I’m yours.  Funnily, the female protagonist in “From the Umberplatzen” is a woman named Kitty who is called Kitty Kat by the male protagonist.  Marcus read about a half dozen of the stories as I was writing them, and he gave me encouragement.  In thanks, I dedicated the book to him.  Robert Olen Butler read the full manuscript early on and was extremely generous with his praise and wrote a gorgeous blurb for the back cover.  It was a project that brought me great joy.

RB:  Your Pulitzer nominated novel – What May Have Been – as well as your recent story collection – Deer and Other Stories – revolve around love. Is this a mere co-incidence? Or is love close to your heart as a theme for stories?

ST:  Love in all its myriad forms is most definitely a life theme for me as a writer.  The heart is the love core of the body and sends its signals to all the other organs.  I believe that people who can love others without expectation of return love are quite rare.  But they’re also probably very healthy.

RB:  You used to be part of a rock band. Can you tell us more about this part of your life and its effect on your writing? What has music taught you that helps your writing?

ST:  In the 80’s I was singing with any band who’d have me.  I did rock, country, folk, pop, you name it.  Well, not blues.  I couldn’t get a handle on blues music though I love it intensely.  I think all the arts intertwine and are feeders for each other.  I loved singing with the bands.  I loved the smoky rooms, purply-blue lights, stage, audience, musicians.  The intensity of it all.  It’s a sexy thing, being the girl singer in a band.  Sometimes it got a bit dangerous, a fight would break out in the audience or some other weirdness.  I remember ducking behind a bar in Keansburg,New   Jersey, to wait out a bar brawl.   Many of those experiences appeared years later on the page when I turned to writing.  I suppose it was a way of re-living those wild times.  Music has its way of opening you up, and in that regard I’m sure it helped me become the writer I turned into.

RB:  Have acting and reading plays early in your life played any part in the way you write?

ST:  Acting, oh yes.  When you are an actor you spend your life reading plays or scripts.  I read hundreds of plays which set my mind toward dialogue.  When I started writing, the dialogue flowed whereas the narrative was more difficult for me.  Acting characters made it easier for me to make characters feel alive on the page.  I think all writers could benefit from some acting classes.  Also, it’s such great fun!

Growing up I was mostly inspired by playwrights.  In my teens I read all of Eugene O’Neill, Tennessee William’s plays, Inge, and many others.   I was hell bent on becoming an actor, and so the plays were a normal progression.  I did read some fiction but I only remember reading Carson McCullers.  She knocked me out.

RB:  Can you share with us a typical writing day in your life?

ST:  My writing days are so atypical, and strange in some ways.  For instance, during the recent hurricane, we had no power so I spent my time working at a café in town that didn’t lose power and has wifi.  A lovely small café called Sandwich Theory.  It’s the kindest place imaginable with a staff of sweeties (Ben, Silvia, and Sonora) who served the food with grace and aplomb to hundreds during the outages.  They just never lost their cool!  Otherwise we may have starved!  Marcelo Silva, who owns the café, set up long tables in his hallway, with those multi-power adapters, so that people could get their work done!  Amazing!  We sat there, around twenty of us at a time, working on our computers shoulder to shoulder.  It was a warm and glorious experience in a period of cold uncertainty.  I also have a Mom who’s been sick a lot since the summer, and I’ve been writing from her hospital room, or in hospital corridors, waiting rooms, wherever.  All in all, it’s been an eclectic writing period for me.

RB:  When working on a piece have you ever turned flash into poetry and vice versa? Where does the line between flash fiction and poetry blur according to you? Where do they part ways?

ST:  I’ve never turned a poem into a flash, or vice versa.  It wouldn’t work for me.  I think form speaks for itself, dictates to its creator what it wishes to be.  It’s like sculpture, in a way.  If I were working on the human form in clay, I couldn’t turn it into an abstract object.  I don’t know the answer about where flash and poetry part ways.  My book “From the Umberplatzen” has been called: a novel, a novel in flash, a novella, prose poems, micro-fictions.  It all lies in the eyes of the beholder, I guess.

RB:   In an interview to Červená Barva Press you said “here was this suburban kid hanging at the farm, who went home for supper then read ‘The Great God Brown’ before bedtime. Mixing things up a bit, I think, but ultimately in a good way.” Can you tell us how all those things, including the music and acting, worked their way into your writing? I’m looking for specific stories and poetry here, if you can mention them. Any characters that were born of your varied interests and activities?

ST:  This is such a great question.  All my characters, female or male, animals, even, are a part of my own life energy.  For instance, when I wrote the voice of the artist Jackson Pollock, in my Cervena Barva Press novel “What May Have Been”, I was writing from my own pool of desires.  I let myself morph into Pollock, the way an actor inhabits a character.  Women have played male roles since before Shakespeare, and vice versa, so it wasn’t anything revolutionary that I wrote Pollock’s voice, or that my co-author Gary Percesepe wrote the voice of Dori, a made-up young woman who was Pollock’s love interest in this novel.  Jackson Pollock is my favorite American contemporary painter and so it was a great honor to be able to give voice to him in this way.

We sat there, around twenty of us at a time, working on our computers shoulder to shoulder.

In my collection “Deer & Other Stories” every single story has its roots in music.  I never realized it until Steve Almond pointed this out at a reading. Two that I’ll discuss here are Within You Without You and Elvis Out of the Meditation Garden.  Within You Without You is a title which I borrowed from the music of Beatle George Harrison.  It’s the driving metaphor of the story involving a young naïve woman who travels to India with the Beatles, and lives to tell about it some forty years later.  The other one, Elvis Out of the Meditation Garden, is a story I love reading aloud because it almost falls into farce when it’s read.  Plus I get to read Elvis’s voice which came out pretty authentic, or so I’ve been told.

RB:  Who were the writers that inspired you when you were growing up?

ST: Growing up I was mostly inspired by playwrights.  In my teens I read all of Eugene O’Neill, Tennessee William’s plays, Inge, and many others.   I was hell bent on becoming an actor, and so the plays were a normal progression.  I did read some fiction but I only remember reading Carson McCullers.  She knocked me out.

RB:  If you were to find yourself in a lift that’s jammed, which flash fiction writers’ works would you prefer to have with you to read? 

ST:  Uh, oh.  This is a semi-loaded question but I’ll answer anyway.  I’m entranced by what James Claffey is writing.  I will go with him because he saddens me in his deep Irish way, then makes me feel all is possible.

Read more in Susan Tepper’s interview with Pif Magazine at her website HERE

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Rumjhum K Biswas has been published all over the world and has won prizes for her poery and fiction, including first prize in the 2012 Anam Cara Short Story Contest. Lifi Publications India is publishing her novel Culling Mynahs and Crows and also her book of short fiction The Vanishing Man and Other Imperfect Men this year.