“Broken Girl”
by Jessie Roark
Snapped ankle. Out of coma. Amnesia. Every day goes by the same. The doctors come in
and ask hundreds of questions. That social worker won’t leave me alone.
Today a tall man with my high cheekbones, wearing a blue jacket, comes in to see me.
“Tess?”
Then I see his cold eyes and I remember.
“Refined Lifestyle”
by Lindsey Cox
Don’s parents said he’d never amount to anything. They said he’d never be successful,
but here he was, sitting in the lap of luxury. The house had magnificently tall ceilings and
elaborate art on the walls that Don admired. He took them down and threw them in the truck
with the rest of the plunder.
Challenges
Challenges
Be alliterative: Only use words that begin with the same letter for the whole story.
Be wordy: Use a series of nouns and verbs, strung together into one long sentence.
Be jokey: Turn your final sentence into a punch line.
Be talkative: Use a voicemail as your entire story.
55 Fiction Contest
For rules and guidelines on entering a 55-word short story contest sponsored by New Times
magazine, visit the following website:
http://www.newtimesslo.com/special-issue/8/55-fiction-winners-08/how-to-enter/
Work
Work Cited
Moss, Steve, Ed. The World’s Shortest Stories. Philadelphia: Running Press, 1995.
55 Word Fiction
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Fiction in a Flash
Writing Flash Fiction
Presented by Jason Stephenson
Oklahoma Writing Project Teacher Consultant
Deer Creek High School teacher
[email protected]
Short Stories & Flash Fiction
Setting
Character(s)
Conflict
Resolution
Flash Fiction
Limited words: 100 words or less
Twist endings (sometimes)
Ernest Hemingway’s 66-word story
For sale: baby shoes, never worn.
Aaron Kidd’s 5555-word story,
story, The Duel
Two foes faced one another on a desert battlefield. Sweat beaded both brows. One
infamous, clothed in black. The other, a golden star over his heart.
They drew revolvers.
Gunshots sounded.
A woman yelled from a nearby porch.
The combatants fell and lay still.
Then, rising, they began to sprint towards the porch.
Snack Time.
Tips
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Use contractions instead of two words.
– He is: 2 words
– He’s: 1 word
Use punctuation instead of conjunctions.
– She glanced over her shoulder and spotted the clown.
– She glanced over her shoulder, spotted the clown.
Use strong words instead of weak ones.
– Strong: verbs, nouns, and sometimes adjectives
– Weak: adverbs, pronouns, interjections, prepositions, conjunctions