I may have mentioned that I’ve been wading through the slush pool over at Every Day Fiction since February.

It’s been an interesting experience, one every writer should try for a time. It doesn’t take long to realize that editors show real restraint when they call the unsolicited manuscript stack “slush”.

But I don’t want to talk about bad writing this time around. I want to discuss a pitfall that claims too many writers, regardless of ability. God knows I’ve stepped into this sort of trap myself, from time to time.

The over-used concept.

If you read much fiction, you know what I mean. Stories about planning the perfect crime. Making a deal with the devil. Murdering a spouse. Picking up a hitch-hiking ghost.

The list goes on and on.

I don’t mean to suggest that something fresh can’t come out of such an idea. It can, it does, but here’s the thing. Authors who take an over-used concept and make it work manage it with style, because their every word sings, rather than straight story-telling technique.

An editor that buys such a story is doing so because they have said, “Damn, look at the way she (or he) makes those words sit up and speak.” Not, “Wow, what a great story!”

So, a word to the wise.

If you want freshness in your flash fiction, look for the true details of life, the small events that draw emotion from your readers because they touch upon what is real. But if you just must write about a character that tries to outwit Old Nick or offers a ride to long-dead lovers, make certain that your story can carry the tune.

Right up to the very last note.

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K. C. Ball grew up in Ohio, with her nose in a book, and now lives in Seattle, a stone’s throw from Puget Sound.

Her flash fiction has appeared on-line at Every Day Fiction, Boston Literary Magazine, Fear & Trembling, Every Day Weirdness, Flashshot and Moon Drenched Fables, as well as in print in Murky Depths #8 and the 2008 Best of Every Day Fiction anthology.

Her most recent flash, At Both Ends, is set to appear in Flash Fiction Online in June and one of her longer pieces, Coward’s Steel, won 3rd place in the Hubbard Foundation’s 1st Quarter, 2009, Writers of the Future competition.

K. C. is a staff reader for Every Day Fiction and blogs about writing at A Moving Line or whatever may strike her fancy at Now Playing in Seattle.