Flash Fiction Chronicles

In the 30-plus years I was a corporate mouthpiece and wordsmith, senior managers occasionally sidled up to ask if I had any tips for writing. Their memos and plans had all the verve of congealed mac and cheese. They knew it, but couldn’t articulate why.
This was the crib sheet that I pulled from my desk drawer for them. The suggestions apply also to flash fiction.

1. Use short words and, when you edit your writing, cut, cut, cut! See what makes this piece stand out:
“Our world’s well served by his last book, The Old Man and the Sea. He said words should be like small, bright stones, seen in the sand through a clear stream. You know it’s tough to find the ones that are lean, have strength, stand up, shout out and sing loud. At last, each best, true, sole verb or noun takes its place. On a good day, we might write just a page, two or three, then call them done.”
Notice that each word in this example has just one syllable? It’s not that word choices are overwhelming, but that we move too fast to complete the assignment. Doing the job too quickly makes it suffer in the process. Who takes the time to go back and change the text, to find the perfect word that will change the reader’s point of view?
2. Decide what result you want to achieve, what message the reader should take away. Each word, each thought must support this end result. Kill the rhetoric that doesn’t have a damn thing to do with your message.
3. Substitute Anglo-Saxon words when you can. Use “strength” instead of “fortitude,” “start” instead of “commence.” Greek and Latin derivatives are soft and mushy. Why say “apprise” or “inform” when “tell” says the same thing in half the syllables?
4. Avoid clichés, as in this real-life example:
“Opening night at the Cirque de Soleil was a strictly A-list affair, with a veritable Who’s Who gathered under the big top for a mind-boggling performance.”
There are four – maybe more – clichés here. Neo-clichés also lurk in memos and meetings: think outside the box, paradigm shift, core competencies, strategic initiative, impact (usually as a verb). Tired words and phrases also grow like nits into lice because it’s easier to use them than come up with an original image.
5. Don’t worry overmuch about the fine points of grammar. Sir Winston Churchill said about dangling participles, “They are an outrage up with which I shall not put.” The same is true about split infinitives. Capt. Kirk always wanted “to boldly go where no one has gone before.” Who’s going to argue with the Captain? Grammatical rigor mortis can make you sound stuffy.
6. As the Microsoft grammar checker on your toolbar demands, choose the active voice over the passive. How easy it is to say, “The policy was reviewed before implementation,” instead of “The manager reviewed the policy before….” It’s amazing to think how much work gets done by itself!
7. Avoid adjectives. They’re a lazy technique for bringing an idea to life. Instead of writing about a “lonely office after everyone has gone home,” go for the image with something like, “The loudest noise was the cleaning woman’s vacuum cleaner at the far end of the hallway.”
8. Escape prosaic, unimaginative writing that dulls the mind. Rewrite sentences, such as “The performance was so exciting that the audience was stunned when it was over,” with imagery. Substitute “There was a minute of stunned silence before the applause broke out.” Undistinguished writing is the stuff of TV news reporters.
9. Lazy verbiage that searches for the dramatic will always hijack your story. Here’s an example that came from one of Mitt Romney’s highly paid Bain & Co. consultants:
“When you join the Corporation, you also become a member of a very special and very unique team. It’s a worldwide team of over 50,000 men and women whose diverse mix of experience, energy and expertise makes us a true force to be reckoned with in the global marketplace. It’s a team that welcomes the challenges associated with gaining and sustaining competitive advantage in an environment where the rules, technology and players change daily. It’s a motivated and directed team whose hard work and breakthrough thinking will move us into the next century.”
Wow! How mind-numbingly vapid!
10. Computer spell checking won’t do your work for you. In The New York Times [1997], Jerry Gray wrote in a page one article, “Holding the dictionary between them and pouring over its pages, [Senators Dole and Daschle] agreed that the words (shall and will) were synonymous. They agreed on shall.” Unfortunately, Reporter Gray didn’t have his own dictionary over which to pore. Spelling must be absolutely correct. If a person can’t spell the difference between burro and burrow, it’s fair to say he doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground.

 

Walt Giersbach’s fiction has appeared Bewildering Stories, Big Pulp, Every Day Fiction, Everyday Weirdness, Lunch Hour Stories, Mouth Full of Bullets, Mystery Authors, OG Short Fiction, Northwoods Journal, Paradigm Journal, Short Fiction World, Southern Fried Weirdness, The Short Humour Site and Written Word.  Two volumes of short stories, Cruising the Green of Second Avenue, have been published by Wild Child (www.wildchildpublishing.com).  He also served for three decades as director of communications for Fortune 500 companies.

And no, I’m not talking about gossip.

Well, maybe I am if it’s a character in a story spreading gossip and thus dialogue is required.

One of the things I like about flash fiction is that dialogue has to be short and sweet. No room for pointless chatter. None. But even when you stick to only the vital dialogue that moves the story along while also giving the reader some idea of the character’s personality, you can still end up over that 1000 word limit.

So how can you keep the important dialogue in when you’re forced to cut words?

Simple.

Remove as many speaker attributions as you can. Those annoying “he said, she said” things get way overwitten. And besides, unless your character talks like a computer drone, most readers can figure out who is saying what by the dialogue alone–especially when you mix a little action in with the dialogue.

I’ll use an excerpt from my current novel-in-progress as a brief example. These three paragraphs occur immediately after Yavar and Shanak have a philosophical “debate” over the nature of revenge. Naturally, Yavar ends the debate in the manner she’s well known for:

“Enough!” Yavar reached for Shanak’s throat only to grasp air.

The god appeared behind her. Both his hands held her head. A burning energy poured out of Yavar and into him as she gasped. Her legs weakened then buckled under her. As she collapsed to the snowy ground, Shanak said, “If you insist on this road, then so be it. But you will not travel it as a god, but as a mortal. The divinity within you is now no more.” He called his staff back to his hand. “But as long as you wield Onarus, you remain a threat to us all. Unfortunately, you and the sword are bonded together.” He raised his staff for a strike. “Do not be troubled, mortal. You will soon meet your brother again.”

Yavar sneered. “That’s what you think.” She drew Onarus, spun, and ran Shanak through. The god’s eyes widened as a grunt escaped his throat. Energy poured back into Yavar, stronger and more potent than what she had stolen from Calahan. “Didn’t see that road, now did you?” 

Note that quite a bit of action and dialogue both occur in just three paragraphs with a speaker attribution appearing only once. You can tell which dialogue is Shanak’s both by it all being in the same paragraph and simply by the preachy way he talks. Yavar’s dialogue is in the first and third paragraph, but even if it wasn’t, readers would be able to tell it was her simply by it being short and sweet and having the sharp vicious wit Yavar fans know and love. The main reason I have it broken into three paragraphs is for clarity’s sake. I could have broken it into further paragraphs, but doing so would cost the sense of immediacy I was looking for.

It is also possible that with a minor tweak, even the one “Shanak said” can get removed, but I’ll worry about that when I get to the novel’s editing phase.

So play with dialogue a little, with the focus on ways to use it without speaker attributions. And while you’re at it, have a little fun experimenting in ways to mix it around with action, too. Once you get it handled, it can be a lot of fun to play with.

Scott M. Sandridge learned how to write through hard work, trial-and-error, and the occasional writers’ workshops. His fiction has appeared in Mindflights, Ray Gun Revival, Silver Blade,  Distant Passages, Volume I, The Best of Every Day Fiction 2008, and Chimeraworld #6: New World Disorder.  His story, “Sleep Paralysis,” was a top ten finisher in the 2008 Preditors & Editors Readers Poll for the category of Short Story – Horror. He also writes reviews for Withersin, and is the Managing Editor of Fear and Trembling. More information can be found at http://smsand.wordpress.com.

When my story “Nipped in the Bud” posted on Every Day Fiction in August, I was eager to see the sort of feedback I would receive.  And then I saw what people had written.  Oh boy.  Reader comments ranged from calling it “hokey” to “it just doesn’t seem to go anywhere.”  I cringed, but I couldn’t really complain.  After all, when my own mother read “Nipped in the Bud,” her first reaction was, “That’s awful!”  She understood the story, and it horrified her.

If one of my greatest supporters says that, I can’t really gripe about comments from strangers.

However, I’ve seen other stories on Every Day Fiction and elsewhere get similar feedback.  Some authors don’t take it well.  They respond to every negative comment, getting both apologetic and defensive.  It leaves me wondering – will this author keep writing?  Or will these harsh words convince them to stop submitting?

Internet anonymity inspires people to type words they wouldn’t dare say face-to-face.  Honesty is important, but so is tact.  Instead of subscribing to the motto of, “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all’ people do say very un-nice things to total strangers – and people get hurt.  Some give up writing.

I’m not at that point now, but I have been in the past.  When I was a teenager, I vowed to be a published novelist by the time I was twenty.  Unfortunately, I didn’t have the spine to make a real attempt.  Two of my well-meaning uncles approached me and told me that I was putting my immortal soul in peril by writing fantasy.  My college creative writing teacher witnessed me reading a fantasy novel and was aghast.  “That’s not a real book,” he said.

By the time I was nineteen, I wasn’t even sure what to read anymore.  As for writing, I stopped completely.

Yes, I was a wimp.  Writing and rejection require a hard shell, and I couldn’t cope.  I wanted my writing to please everyone – which was downright impossible, no matter the genre.  It took me another ten years to mature and take my writing seriously and understand that criticism is part of the business.

Time and time again, editors advise writers “don’t take it personally.”  There is truth to that.  However, as a writer – especially a vulnerable beginner – some people will have a harder time separating themselves from their writing.  That doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be given negative feedback.  It’s necessary.  It’s how we grow and improve, whether the project is flash fiction or a full novel draft.  But even if a story comes across as complete nonsensical garbage, that doesn’t mean it should be described in comments that way.  Tact and respect are not antiquated notions.  At least, I hope not.

I can handle my story being hokey and sometimes misunderstood.  As long as some people get it – and enjoy it – that’s what matters.  If I’m going to put my soul on the line, I don’t want it to be a total waste.

Beth Cato’s work has appeared in places such as Every Day Fiction, Niteblade Fantasy and Horror Magazine, Crossed Genres, and Six Sentences. A full list of her publication credits is available at BethCato.com.

DEAR ABIGAIL:

Can I ask some advice? When you are writing, say a first draft, do you find yourself wanting to edit before the words are even down on the page? I feel like I really struggle with a kind of ocd-perfectionism-control issue that causes a lot of unnecessary stress and waste of time, my mind writing and editing simultaneously so that I lose focus on that which I’m writing about.

The words, the act of writing, get in the way of the fictional world I’m writing about, so that I can’t put down the words without thinking about whether those words are “right” or not. And the paradox is I know that the words are closet to being right when you are not thinking about them but about the content… yet it is a habit of my mind that is not easily diverted… Any advice?

Your friend in Seattle.

DEAR FRIEND IN SEATTLE:

I totally get your edit-and-write simul-mode.  Isn’t that how you’d say it in your century?  That used to be me.  Consider conducting a little experiment.  Give yourself a week.  Promise yourself you’ll stick to it.  And stick to it.

The experiment is to practice not editing, but it’s hard to tell yourself not to edit.  It’s even embarrassing to some to leave a flaw anywhere on the page, but NO ONE IS READING THIS BUT YOU until you are ready to share, so give yourself permission to ignore all errata at least for the duration of the experiment.  Need help with this?  Read on.

For one whole week tell yourself, “I’m going to do Abigail’s little experiment.  It only lasts a week.  I can do anything for seven days, can’t I?”  And when it’s over, I don’t ever have to do it again.

Do this: Get a spiral notebook, college ruled, and label it, “UNEDITED CRAP.”  (Oh crap.  I said “crap.”) If you don’t have a spiral notebook, use any lined paper or use one of those contraptions with the thing you call a keyboard but which to me does not contain the beauty and grace of  the ebony and ivory of a pianoforte’s keyboard).  How you write doesn’t matter a whit.

Then every day, for twenty to thirty minutes, you decide, set an egg timer (worth you buying one and putting it on your desk),  and write.

The rules are:

• You cannot reread, you cannot stop, until the timer goes off. 
• Go fast, fast, fast. The idea is to cover as many sheets of paper as you can.
• GET OUT OF YOUR OWN WAY.  Remember this isn’t about you, what you write, if you’re good, or if you’re a piece of shit, it’s about you putting words on paper for seven days within a time limit. Period.  Without rereading or editing.
• Do not stop.  Did I say this?  If you can’t think of anything to say, scribble or type “I can’t think of anything to say” over and over until you think of something to say.
• DO NOT STOP AND READ WHAT YOU’VE WRITTEN.  THIS WILL INVALIDATE THAT ENTRY IN THE EXPERIMENT.  YOU MIGHT CONSIDER COMING BACK AND TRYING AGAIN IN A COUPLE HOURS ON THE SAME DAY.
• If you find yourself resisting, resist the resistance. Just go do it and do it every day for seven days.
• THINK AS LITTLE AS YOU CAN. THIS SHOULD BE VISCERAL. 
• Let your stories come out and if you don’t know where to take the story next, then type, “where do I take this story next? Who is this character? What did he eat for breakfast”and then just go again.  It would be okay to have a short list of questions written in the inside cover of the notebook or on an index card by the computer you could glance at if you get stuck.  This kind of stuck is not about did you say it right, but what do I say next?  Caution:  I used the words “glance at the list.” That doesn’t mean read the list, consider the list in a leisurely fashion, think about the list.  The timer is ticking away.  When I say “glance,” I mean “glance and GO!”
• DO NOT THINK about thinking.

At the end of the week, go back through your document and see what’s there.  Remember how you called it “UNEDITED CRAP?”

That’s the good part because you don’t expect much, do you?  So when you see that much of what you’ve written is pretty good, you’ll be pleasantly surprised.  And guess what?  Now you can edit.