Short Story Month wouldn’t be complete without some first-rate flash fiction. This morning, enjoy the following selections by Tara L. Masih, editor of The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction and author of the excellent collection Where the Dog Star Never Glows (Press 53, 2010) and the flash fiction chapbooks Fragile Skins and Tall Grasses.
Below are first-line teasers; click on each story title to read (or listen to) the rest.
- “Dodging Frogs on Blackbird Road,” via Electric Flash (page 25 of the PDF)
Never mind hindsight . . . after stretching and straining our bodies in training one hot afternoon, slapping at flies that dove into our faces varnished with sweat, we returned to our cabin when darkness reminded us to wash up, dress up, head for the local bar…
- “A Haunt of Memory,” via The Drum
Somehow, my friend Finneus makes do. He makes his way through life with a stick, an ear tuned into a different station, hands and feet that know this world better than you or I ever will…
- “This Heat,” via Midway Journal
Bats are flying around on the third floor again. Trapped. We live on a hill, so the height attracts them…
- “Fire Island, 1977,” via Apollo’s Lyre
My fourteenth birthday on Fire Island I was rocked by many things for the first time. It was the first time my mother let me go, having heard of the dangerous waves and of the men who wore earrings pierced through their nipples…
- “Huldi (India 1990),” via the Asia Writes Project
Day 1, twilight
Surrounded by voices murmuring, laughing, and giggling as skin makes unaccustomed contact with her. She is the center of it all, sari radiating from her anointed body in iridescent petal folds. Women—relatives, friends, neighbors—hover about in a hum like honeybees eager to stroke and gather. What do they want? …
