Tag: Flash Fiction and Focus

Review: Book Fair at The Hilt

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Image Credits:- All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated with many created in Book Brush. Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing. Screenshots taken by me, Allison Symes.
Many thanks to Vie Portland, Janet Williams, and Richard Hardie for contributing images to this week’s Chandler’s Ford Today post, the rest are from me. Lovely Book Fair, more details below and in my CFT post. (And there will be exciting news about new online magazine, Writers’ Narrative, which will be launched soon, in my next post here and on my Facebook timeline prior to that – lots going on).

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Facebook – General and Chandler’s Ford Today

It is with great pleasure I share Review: Book Fair at The Hilt for Chandler’s Ford Today this week. Talk about writing (a) what you know and (b) what you love, this post is a fabulous example of that. If you were at the fair, I hope this makes for a good look back at the event. If you missed it, see it as something not to miss next time!

I look at the hard work behind the scenes (some of it anyway) and I was glad to say there was a good contingent representing Chandler’s Ford Today too. Naturally there was plenty of networking going on and it gave every author taking part to spread the word about what they do – that was much appreciated.

And if that was not enough I have exciting news to share about Writers’ Narrative, the new online magazine which will be coming out shortly. I’ll talk more about this tomorrow but this will be something of use to every writer so worth watching out for.

Review: Book Fair at The Hilt

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Nice to be back in the swimming pool today (making the most of the quiet before the six weeks summer holidays!). Lady got to see her Rhodesian Ridgeback bestie and Coco, a lovely Labradoodle. All three dogs were so pleased to see each other.

As well as being on Amazon, I‘m pleased to say you can find me on Waterstones, Hive, Bookshop.org, and, naturally, the Bridgetown Cafe Bookshop (which covers the books from Bridge House Publishing/CafeLit/Chapeltown Books). If you ever come across somewhere which says the books are out of stock, panic not! This simply means the book is a print on demand one (and is not really in stock as such) but it doesn’t take long for the online bookshop to get these in.

I’ve ordered my own books from Hive and Bookshop, as well as directly from Bridgetown, and received them quickly. You can also contact me directly via my website (https://allisonsymescollectedworks.com) as well. There are plenty of options here – I like that as a reader, as well as from a writer’s perspective.

 

Hope you have had a good day. Lady got to see her Hungarian Vizler friend again today. Both dogs happy. It’s lovely to see friendships like that.

Writing wise, I’m looking forward to sharing my review of the Book Fair on Chandler’s Ford Today this week. Link up on Friday. See above. Got some feedback sent off to the organisers yesterday too as they are keen to have feedback. It helps with planning for future events.

Feedback is useful elsewhere too. I appreciate the feedback given on Friday Flash Fiction. It is always useful to know what others make of your stories (even though that can be nerve wracking too). It is how you can learn though what works, what clearly didn’t work quite so well and so on. (Reviews are helpful here too)

When I give feedback, I explain what my thinking is behind it. I’ve been grateful for this myself when I’ve been on the receiving end. Again, you can learn a lot from this. You can see how others read your works. They may well pick up on things (good and bad) which didn’t occur to you.

Sometimes you are in for a nice surprise here.

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It is a soggy end of the week so definitely time for a new story then. Hope you like my latest on Friday Flash Fiction – The Neighbours. This story was loosely inspired by the long running sitcom Last of the Summer Wine and the marvellous female characters in that.

Oh and I will have exciting news to share about forthcoming new online magazine Writers’ Narrative to share tomorrow. Watch this space, as they say. More details in my post next week here.

Screenshot 2023-07-14 at 10-10-17 The Neighbours by Allison Symes


Flash has a powerful impact due to its brevity and this can be used brilliantly for humorous stories. Who doesn’t love a punchline ending? It is also good for twist in the tale stories.

But it can also work well for thoughtful pieces. A character shares something of their life with a reader. They don’t want to go on too much. They want to show what matters. And this can have what I call the “punch in the gut” effect on a reader when done well.

Stories of all lengths encourage empathy as we understand the characters we’re reading about. Flash can be used to bring about that empathy in fewer words!

May be an image of text that says "Reading can encourage empathy as we follow what characters do and say."A major benefit of writing flash fiction for me has been to improve my focus. I have to ask do I really need this in my story? If there is any doubt, the answer is no! Out the words come along with the usual wasted words of mine I can’t help writing but which I know need to be surgically removed. Still at least that gets my editing off to a good start.

We all have wasted words/pet phrases. It does help to be aware of them. It helps even more to recognise that well over 95% of the time, these things don’t add anything useful to your story so out they come.

Maybe it is a form of comfort writing, I don’t know. What matters though is getting your work done and then improving it. So if that means having to write my wasted words and then take them out again that’s fine by me. I know this method works!

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Fairytales with Bite – Storytelling

We all love stories but do your characters? Do they value certain types of story or are they the more practical type who can’t see the use of books etc? I understand there are some folk out there like that for real. Never understood them but there you go.

But you could well end up having characters who have the same view and set them against someone who does treasure books and stories? What conflicts could that lead to? If their quest relies on a story to help them fulfil it, how does the negative one handle that? How would they react when old legends are proven true and has a direct impact on the success of their mission? Do they change their outlook?

Also give some thought as to how storytelling is done? Is your setting based on an oral tradition or is literacy widespread? Are stories confined to the printed age or is there technology, as we would understand the term, and what is this and how is it used? Can everyone have the benefit?

What stories do your characters like? What stories are forbidden in your setting and why? Inevitably there will be someone trying to read something they shouldn’t. What is this? What are the consequences? There are always consequences! What seems like a harmless story to one characters is anything but to another and that could make for an interesting story in itself.

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This World and Others – The Value of Books

Books to me represent entertainment, education, and inspiration. They represent literacy obviously, but also my freedom to read. Not everyone has that. I also treasure favourite books and stories of course.

Which books and stories would your characters treasure? Which can they not abide at any cost? Are books available to all? Who controls the overall reading list? What does their taste in books say about them?

How does your world value books, assuming they do? Are books a recent development or has your setting had these wonderful things for centuries? Are there set books everyone is expected to read? If so, which would these be and why? Did they develop importance immediately on publication or has this happened over time?

Then there’s monetary value. Some books are worth a lot simply due to their rarity or important historical factors behind them? Would your setting value books like that? Are there book exchanges, auctions of books etc? What would your characters be prepared to do to get a book of immense value to them?

And books can contain secrets? Again what would a character do to get hold of a book which means everything to them from that angle? I could see murder being committed there! Certainly there are story ideas here. Happy writing!

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AMAZON AUTHOR CENTRAL – ALLISON SYMES
As well as selling my books, I was selling books I've contributed to - those went well too

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News, Getting Enough Sleep, and Random Scenario Generators

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Image Credits:-
All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated. Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing. Screenshots taken by me, Allison Symes.
Hope the last few days have been okay. More signs of spring here (and no snow!) – my camellia is blooming, the daffodils are out, and my lilac is coming into leaf.

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Facebook – General

I was chatting with a friend at Slimming World tonight about my writing hours. I think people fall into two categories – night owl or lark – and I am definitely in the latter category. I used to be able to stay up to all hours writing. Not any more!

I know I need a certain amount of sleep and I try to ensure I get that. Looking after myself here for me is a non-negotiable. I don’t write well when over tired. Mind you, I don’t do anything well when over-tired! So I work out when I will do my writing and pretty much stick to the same times. When I can get in an extra session or two I do.

But sitting down regularly at the same times has kind of conditioned me that this is now writing time, I get on with it, and I find I can get a reasonable amount done. No two writers will write in exactly the same way. No two writers will work in exactly the same way. You do have to work out what works for you but the getting enough sleep aspect will make a difference, regardless of whether you’re an owl or a lark.

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A busy Monday as always. Never sorry to get to this end of the day when I can relax and write. Managed to make some good progress yesterday on various blogs I write for and that is always handy. It means I’ve always got something to hand when I need it and it compensates for those days when, for whatever reason, I can’t get quite so much writing as I would like done. It happens and you get used to it so when I have a really good day, as I did yesterday, I’ve learned to make the most of it! They say go with the flow. Sometimes the flow is very much with you! I like days like that.

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I’ll be talking about Making Characters Real in Fiction for Chandler’s Ford Today this week. Link up on Good Friday.

Don’t forget the April edition of Mom’s Favorite Reads is FREE – see Amazon link below – and it is packed full of wonderful articles and stories. Do try it and check out my flash fiction column on Page 66 where I talk, appropriately, about Dialogue in Flash Fiction.

Sometimes I do write all dialogue flash pieces and this works well in such a short form. I’ve found all dialgoue pieces work best when kept to between 100 and 300 words or thereabouts, slap bang in flash fiction territory of course.

It’s an interesting writing exercise to have a go at too as you have to find a way of showing readers the setting without using description, the conversation between your characters has to be natural and not “info dump”, and it still has to be a proper story with a proper beginning, middle and end.


Hope you have had a reasonable day. No snow this weekend so that already makes it a win! Looking forward to catching up with friends from Swanwick later on via Zoom.

You know I said my next in person event was going to be in June at the Association of Christian Writers Golden Jubilee weekend? Err… that was correct at the time of going to “press”, so to speak! It isn’t now.

Yes, I am off to The Hayes in June and really looking forward to what will be a fun event but in the meantime I’m going to be in London in May running a fiction workshop. Will say more nearer the time but looking forward to doing this and heading off to Derbyshire in June.

Am busy blogging and preparing future blogs as well as talks so plenty to keep me occupied at the old keyboard. I like it that way even though it does mean I tend to wear the letters off the keyboard. Thankfully I can touch type!

Had a lovely time catching up with ACW friends on Zoom last night. I know if my dad was still around, I’d have problems keeping him off Zoom! He’d have loved it.

Writing tip of the day: Never worry about writing a perfect draft. Why? Because nobody ever does. Just get something written, then worry about improving it.

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Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

I mentioned yesterday I found a Random Scenario generator and I hope to have lots of fun playing with this.

It strikes me I can use this in more than one way. Use the generated prompt directly. Equally I can take that as a starting point and add my own twist to it. I used yesterday’s prompt of a bit of paper stuck in a chest of drawers as it was but if I wanted to put a twist to that, I could’ve added in another object, a sinister one maybe, being stuck in a drawer further down.

The focus of the story could’ve been on that and then I would reveal what the paper said at the end and it would inevitably be something the character should have found sooner but they were distracted by the sinister object instead. All sorts of things could have come from that – especially the ending. It could make all the difference between the ending being a happy one or not.

So if a prompt really strikes you, why not add in your own “spiel” to it and see where that takes you? It will help you craft a unique tale.

 

It’s Monday, it’s YouTube story time again. I’m pleased to share Reading the Market. Hope you like it. It is very short though! The idea for this one came from a Random Scenario prompt – yes, there is such a thing!


Now you know I hope by now that I do love my random generators for triggering story ideas. I’ve found another one! How does the Random Scenario generator grab you? Well, it grabs me nicely enough and I plan to write up a couple of stories based on what I’ve just generated. Will share what I do with these as yet unwritten stories later but I am looking forward to giving this a go. The screenshot gives you an idea of what you’ll see when you click on the link below.

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The box with the prompt in appears beneath the Generate Scenario button. I hope to have fun playing with this one. And there’s nothing to stop you tweaking the generated scenario a bit so it fits in with your style of writing either.

This is the thing with any kind of prompt. Yes, you can write to them directly and a lot of the time that’s precisely what I do, but sometimes I have a prompt which I like but I can then see a way of tweaking it to make it best suit my style of writing so I do that and away I go. Do use these things as starting points too.

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One important aspect to flash fiction is it makes you focus on what is important for your story to happen and make sense. No boring description. No dialogue that doesn’t add anything to the plot or what we need to know about the characters.

This is why writing flash fiction sharpens up all of the other writing you do. It has helped me a lot with my blogging. It helps me to write down what is important about my story/character but you don’t need to go into chapter and verse about that. Often the odd line or two is enough to keep me on track.

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Goodreads Author Blog – The Joy of Short Fiction

Hands up time. I write short stories and flash fiction so I am bound to be biased here. Regardless of that, I have always loved short stories (and discovering flash fiction was a revelation to my reading diet as well as my writing one). I will read flash and short story collections in between reading novels or longer non-fiction books. I kind of see them as an appetiser for the next “big book”.

But I love the impact of short fiction. You do get the pay-off that much more quickly and I enjoy reading that s well as writing it. I’ve always loved inventing people and thought that the best bit of storytelling. So with my short form work, I get to do that all of the time so win-win there!

And short stories have gone on to be turned into films. The most famous example has to be The Birds by Daphne du Maurier, famously turned into a movie by Alfred Hitchcock.

I also see reading short story and flash collections as a chance to try out an author’s style before I commit to reading their longer work. From a reader’s viewpoint, this is lovely because in an anthology you can get to try out a dozen or so different authors and if some really strike you, then you’ve discovered more authors to try out. What’s not to like about that?

And of course, many an author gets into print via the short fiction route in the first place. I am just one of them!

Allison Symes - Flash Fiction Collections

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Random Questions and Feedback

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Image Credits:-
All images from Pixabay/Pexels unless otherwise stated. Some images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos. Screenshots taken by me, Allison Symes. Book cover images from Chapeltown Books and Bridge House Publishing.
Good to see the evenings slowly becoming lighter in my part of the world. It’s still January though… aka the month that goes on for what seems like forever!

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Facebook – General

So cold out there today in my part of the world – even the dog wasn’t impressed.

Had a lovely time talking about flash fiction via Zoom to an ACW-affiliated group last night. I do hope it leads to more people trying flash fiction for themselves – it is good fun, addictive, and helps you sharpen your writing skills.

Certainly I’m not afraid of editing thanks to writing flash and it also makes me think about the impact of my stories and characters from the start. Doing that means I am thinking about the reader’s needs immediately. It also means I am less likely to go off at unhelpful tangents which only slow stories down.

And it is the perfect format for those times when you don’t have much time to write. You can get something drafted in a few minutes. The great thing is it doesn’t have to be perfect. That’s what the editing stages are for!

 

Has been a good Monday for me – as busy as ever but I seemed to get more things done more quickly. I wish all Mondays were like that. Still you treasure the good ones you get!

I’ve used the same prompt (from a random question generator) to trigger two stories. One I’ve submitted to Friday Flash Fiction and the other one I’ll share on my book page shortly as it is the latest in my YouTube videos. The question generated was what makes you cry? Link further down.

Interesting one as you can take this in a tragic direction but there is a possibility for comedy too (which is the direction I’ve taken). And of course you can adjust it to think about what would make your character cry.

I love random generators. They really make me put my thinking cap on.

 

Have been enjoying a quiet weekend. I’ll be taking a broad look at Characters in Fiction for Chandler’s Ford Today later this week. Looking forward to sharing that on Friday. Have been spending time preparing pieces for different blog spots – plenty to keep me out of mischief anyway!

And I am also getting my author newsletter together ready for that to go out on 1st February. (Do head over to my landing page at https://allisonsymescollectedworks.com if you would like to sign up – I share news, tips, prompts, videos etc here).

What is the one thing you like most about writing? I know it’s hard to say but for me that feeling of knowing you’ve created a piece of work that you can’t improve any more and someone else has accepted it – well, it is hard to beat that one!

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Hope you have had a good Saturday. Many thanks for the comments coming in on Someone Like Her my latest tale on Friday Flash Fiction. It is lovely receiving feedback from other readers on this site and I love reading through the other stories too.

What I find helpful in feedback I receive is in finding out what readers responded to – was it the character, the twist ending etc? (This is another reason why book reviews matter – it isn’t just the number received, it is what is said here as well).

And in giving feedback, I look to stress the positives, share what I think can be improved, and maybe make market suggestions if something obvious comes to mind. Sometimes a story you’re reading for a competition just calls into mind a possible market for it.

Am looking forward to giving a Zoom talk on Monday night too. So all go at the moment but in a very good way.

Screenshot 2022-01-21 at 19-08-10 Someone Like Her, by Allison SymesBookBrushImage-2022-1-25-20-3855

Facebook – From Light to Dark and Back Again

Many thanks for the views coming in so far on Crying, my latest YouTube video. Much appreciated, always.  See video link below.

For a short story like this one, I nearly always go for using the first person. I can take you straight into my character’s head and show you their thoughts, attitudes and actions. I like to think of it as “hitting the ground running”.

The funny thing here though is I had barely used first person before writing flash fiction. I suppose for a short word count format the immediacy of the “I” character has more impact than it would do in a longer piece where its effect might be “diluted” a bit. I do know it works really well in flash though.

 

Pleased to be sharing my latest YouTube story called Crying. This came from a random question generator and the question that came up was what makes you cry? Find out here what makes my character cry. Hope you enjoy it.


I’ve never liked those stories where the description seems to go on for ever and ever, amen. Funnily enough I have no problems here with classic novels where the writers had to spell everything out for their readers (no TV, no film, no easy way of a reader visualising what London looks like etc).

But in this day and age where we can get a good idea of what a place looks like because of our experiences with TV and film, I certainly don’t want to see that kind of description in any kind of story.

This is where flash fiction comes into its own. It makes you focus on only the most important things that have to go into the story for it to make sense. Having to work to a tight word count means you have to make choices but it is all for the good of the story – and that is always a great thing. Regardless of what we write, we should always be focusing on what is for the good of the story (which is where that famous phrase about “killing your darlings” comes in I suspect).

(But if you do want a great read right now and one which is free how about following this link to Mom’s Favorite Reads?).

 

Am giving a Zoom talk on Monday night about flash fiction. Love talking about that. I also think it is a great form for people who don’t have a lot of time to write but know they want to write something! And you can. Over time you can build up another flash stories for your own collections etc. I remain convinced in learning to write to a tight word count, that skill will carry over into writing query letters, synopses etc that also have to “not go on for too long” and convey information to attract an agent/publisher quickly.

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Goodreads Author Blog – Best Friends in Fiction

With my other writing hat on, I blog including for a weekly online magazine. My current topic for them is Best Friends in Fiction but I realised it would be a good topic for Goodreads too. When a lead character and their best friend/sidekick character are well portrayed, it is a joy to read their adventures and the interactions between them.

Can you imagine Holmes without Watson or Wooster without Jeeves? So many classic stories depend on the best friend character – and across genres too. Think Sam Gamgee and his support of Frodo Baggins in The Lord of the Rings. (It was literal support at some points too).

Characterisation has always been what makes or breaks a story (of any length) for me. I have got to understand where the characters are coming from, even if I disagree with their attitudes and actions. And for lead and best friend characters I have got to see why the lead has the best friend character they do.

Holmes is a genius but needs Watson to temper that but Holmes does recognise that. Watson knows he can never be as brilliant as Holmes but knows he has his own role to play that could not be fulfilled by Holmes. Can you imagine Holmes trying to narrate a story for the masses? Err… no I think!

Do you have any favourite best friend fictional characters and if so why have you chosen these? Mine is Sam Gamgee – you can’t beat the guy for loyalty and guts when it matters.

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