Good things come in small packages...

Some people are really good at flash fiction, others find it hard to get to grips with a story that is sometimes as short as 50 words.  But that is the joy of the challenge.  How do you get a valid story across in so few words?  Practice, practice, practice.  Flash stories are little treasures and an excellent way of honing the art of writing.  If anything, flash writing teaches us to be economic with words, a commodity no writer should be without.

The following two flashes, One Last Look and Vulcan Rising, appear on Lily Child's Friday Predictions.  Click on the link below to take a look at some great flash fiction writing:

http://lilychildsfeardom.blogspot.com


One Last Look

It fell in gentle waves, cool and hushed at first.

Then the darkness moved across the city and pithy droplets became heavier. The resonant hum of the city chided his conscience; he saw great concrete monoliths stretching into the air, lights glowing and winking in tandem. It was a place he once worked, a place he once belonged.

Something flashed. The percussion of rain grew forceful as though to admonish the humidity clouding the alleys and stairwells. He looked up from his cardboard world; the downpour mottled his skin.

And he couldn’t help but smile as the needle went in.


Vulcan Rising

A deathly darkness descended.

It clung to walls and peppered the streets, stifled the sun. A strange scent lingered as though to tease with acidic disdain. Cadmium tinted columns of smoke coiled into the air as though the forge of Vulcan had scorched the earth.

The stinging breath of a monster filled the passageways, sucked up the air. Inanimate, waif-like shapes huddled together in disparate clusters, crowding the cellars and storehouses. One had gone to lie down in bed, but had burned beneath the coalescing detritus.

Flesh sizzled and slithered from bones.

The mountain rumbled. Vesuvius had awakened once more.