The genre of flash fiction has become more popular and visible in recent years, thanks to the work of people like today’s Friday Five writer, Tommy Dean. A writer of “mostly flash fiction,” as he puts it on his website, Dean also is an editor of the flash fiction literary magazine Fractured Lit and a writing coach who offers editing services and writing workshops. He is the author of Hollows (Alternating Current Press, 2022), a collection of flash stories, and two flash fiction chapbooks, Special Like the People on TV (Redbird Chapbooks, 2014) and Covenants (ELJ Editions, 2021). He has been previously published in The Lascaux Review, New World Writing, and Pithead Chapel. His stories have been included in Best Microfiction 2019 and 2020. He lives in Indiana with his wife and two children, and he and I share the common experience of having detasseled corn in our youth.
1. How would you define flash fiction and how does it differ from the more traditional short story?
I like to think of the flash form as a room whose walls are enclosing, with the character standing in the middle, seeing their world shrinking, knowing they must do something to stop the walls, to make them reverse, or find a way to shrink themselves to find the mouse hole in the corner or to enlarge themselves enough to bust through the encroaching structure that threatens to squish them. Due to the lack of space, as created by the dwindling word count, Flash demands a sense of velocity, a rush to get to a point outside of these crushing walls. Characters race against the outside pressure of the small word count to reveal themselves to the reader, to themselves, to the antagonist that puts pressure on them to make a choice, to take an action they wouldn’t otherwise take if it weren’t for this narrative. In short stories, characters are given many attempts to rise above themselves, to fail, and fail worse, before coming to their reckoning.
Flash relies on fewer opportunities, less guidance for the main character and the reader, more depth created by figurative language, and just-right details than accruement of backfill and backstory. Short stories and novels are the whole nine rounds of a boxing match, while flash is a duck of one punch, and the quick retaliation of a one-two punch for the knockout win. It’s the flash bulb and the reaction in the dark, the scene coming in and out of focus, before being lost.
2. It seems flash fiction and micro fiction have become more popular in recent years. Why is that?
Writers and readers are excited about new ways to tell stories. Short stories are easier to read on screens, yet they can be as affecting as any longer story. They have a sense of play, a desire to break narrative rules, and a glimpse of character and conflict, a bite-size rush of feeling.
3. As editor of Fractured Lit, what kind of stories are you looking for?
I’m looking for stories that make me feel something, that have characters who aren’t afraid to act, to make mistakes, to reveal themselves to the reader, who go through a moment and have the possibility of being changed by it. A story that lingers long past the last period. Stories that thrive in their use of brevity, that use esclations to move the story along.
4. How do you balance your time and responsibilities as a writer, a writing instructor, and an editor of a literary journal?
Poorly?! I’m constantly shifting from job to job, from writing to editing, and back again. I try to make lists and cross off items as I complete them, but then sometimes I get an idea for a crafty essay or a new story, and I’m off to the races on that instead. Or sometimes, I just want to read! I try to prioritize my own creativity and writing in the stream of all my responsibilities! But I love being in a community with writers, reading their stories, helping refine them in small ways, celebrating their wins, and publishing surprising and affecting work! I’m so behind on my emails!
5. Finally, what advice do you have for aspiring writers of flash or micro fiction?
That first draft is for you, the writer, telling yourself the story. The subsequent drafts are for the reader, so revise it with them in mind! Apply brevity rigorously. In short stories, characters are given many attempts to rise above themselves, to fail, and fail worse, before coming to their reckoning. Flash relies on fewer opportunities, less guidance for the main character and the reader, more depth created by figurative language and just right details than accruement of backfill and backstory.
Follow Tommy Dean on Twitter at @TommyDeanWriter and subscribe to his Substack, Flash Perspectives.
Andy writes! 