A Short Guide to Writing Microfiction
By: Jane Trombley
Tags: Flash Fiction, Microfiction, Creativity, Advice, Writing

Microfiction is the literary equivalent of painting with three colors.

It is an exercise in the economy of resources. It requires both discipline and imagination.

Somehow, the idea of flash fiction, a slightly longer genre, seems like writing the Great American Novel, wordy to the point of unwieldy.

Microfiction is loosely defined as a story of up to 300 words. That’s the writer’s full palette.

Make every word work hard.

Carefully chosen words and phrases must support the spare structure of the plot, evoking engagement, and sparking the imagination to fill in the scant prose. It’s the brevity that is the challenge, evoking the emotion. Every word must count.

Microfiction includes devices found in longer pieces: setting and atmosphere, tension, even a plot twist at the end. The dialogue, if any, must pack a punch, lending emotional realism as it moves the story along its narrative arc.

Writing the dialogue is a bit like imagining the lone cowboy who says, “yep” to everything, but manages to convey a range of meaning and emotion with just one syllable. And maybe a lift of the brow.

Start with the basics: a beginning, middle, and end.

Microfiction doesn’t skip these essential story elements. Instead, it strips them down to the bare minimum with evocative language. It is the ultimate in “show, don’t tell” throughout the story arc.

The first sentence has got to engage the reader from the get-go. Microfiction dictates the emotional timbre of the story. It is the underpinning for the juxtaposition of the conflict that follows.

It’s not easy when the whole thing is the length of an opening paragraph in more traditional fiction. With well-chosen words, the writer “paints” suspense, foreboding, and joy engaging the reader’s imagination. We, the writer and reader, are in this together, in for a short but very intense ride.

The outcome, sometimes with a clever plot twist, rewards the reader with the element of surprise. You, the writer, have bopped the reader on the head. Well done.

Engage the reader’s imagination.

The ability to unlock the reader’s imagination is fundamental to successful microfiction. Let’s take another look at the “Baby Shoes” story. It’s an extreme example and as such, wonderfully illustrative.

The elements are laid bare: the shoes, unused, are meant for a baby. They are available for sale. But why is it up to the reader’s imagination. Were they the wrong color? Wrong size? Are they rejected for poor quality? All plausible reasons, but none are emotionally gripping.

What is emotionally gripping is the suggestion of heartbreaking proportion. It is only conjecture, left to the reader’s fancy: perhaps the baby didn’t survive to wear the shoes. The reader could as easily imagine a fickle, fashion-conscious mother rather than a tragic loss. But we go for the emotional hook.

With microfiction, the ending is often in the imagination of the reader, not in the words of the story.

Write a title that is more than a title, but an integral part of the story.

In microfiction, the title is much more a part of the story. It must grab, of course, but it must deliver more. It needs to foreshadow without giving anything away. It needs to summarize in a way that preps the reader for what the scant word count will deliver.

I’ve learned this the hard way. In one of my early microfiction pieces, I stumbled upon a headline that delivered.

( I’m a fan of 50-word masterpieces. Micro, microfiction.)

See, the title hints at what to expect. No specifics, but the premise of the story is pretty much laid out.

A later piece demonstrates what most writers experience at some point — you learn more from your failures than your successes.

In this case, the title is oblique, telling the reader nothing about the story. The picture is more of a clue than the title.

The story itself has suspense and intrigue folded into a tidy 50–word package. The sparse language contributes to the rising tension, or so I like to think.

But what the hell? “Equivalency”? It does nothing to prep the reader. It is a total dud as a title.

I still like this piece, done early along my microfiction learning curve. I share it with you, writer-to-writer, as I have no shame. And, in the context of this brief tutorial, to illustrate the point of how a micro-headline should work.

In case you missed it: this is a glaring example of a headline that doesn’t work.

The stars of short fiction.

Fiction all-stars have dabbled in flash fiction; some with microfiction: Margaret Atwood, Paulo Coelho, David Foster Wallace. And a host of others.

As a piece of flash fiction, or more precisely a flash tutorial, nothing beats Jamaica Kincaid’s “Girl.”

Lydia Davis, who won the Man Booker International Prize in 2013, is probably considered the reigning queen of flash fiction. Her process reveals a dedicated work ethic and is a testimony to the focus required to write this concise form of storytelling effectively.

I love her work. Here’s a recent example.

Get out that blank canvas, mix and match those three colors. The results can be stunning.