Flash Fiction Festival 2023
Another fabulous weekend with experts on writing (very) short fiction. Flash Fiction is anything up to 1,000 words, although I've noticed that the upper limit seems to be getting lower. 500 words seems to be common for submissions, or 300. Much shorter stories are called micro-fictions and can be 100 words or less.
I don't claim to be an expert in flash - my comfort zone (and preferred reading) is novel-length, although I have written two novellas-in-flash (but see what I'm doing there? A much longer story in very short chapters!). I went to the very first Flash Fiction Festival a few years ago because I really didn't know what flash fiction was and was keen to find out. Not only is it various incredibly inventive types of short-short fiction, I have to add that learning about it has taught me an enormous amount about writing in general - flash is an exacting discipline that forces a writer to think very carefully about every choice.
I also had the privilege of leading a workshop (with extremely engaged authors - first thing on Saturday morning!) on Climate Writing. My topic this year was on different ways of approaching the climate crisis in fiction, where hope, generosity and ingenuity are deployed in unexpected ways. We had a lively discussion and they went away with new ideas to explore. So my workshop was more on content than craft - there are some wonderful teachers of craft at the Festival.
Next year there will be another in-person event, but keep an eye on the FFF website for zoom days scattered throughout the year. The Festivals are also enormous fun, with gentle competitions, readings, a book stall, freebies, new friends, good food and even karaoke...
"Word Cricket" - stories written at speed from random prompts thrown out every minute or so. Photo credit: @FlashFicFest 2023