short stories Archives - Addicted to Writing

And lived to tell the tale. You might find it weird that I had the need to write about it, but hey, first times can to be special.

And while I have created many blog posts, and a lot of longer fiction (several scripts and a novel), I hadn’t written a short story that wasn’t for a school project. Stories tend to come to me in longer forms and plots. That said, I’ve gotten into reading short stories and discovered some interesting gems.

As for this one, I had this scene in my mind for some time. I didn’t know whether it would be a part of a longer story, but I realized it stood perfectly well on its own. It’s a bit tragicomic, dark, honest and blunt. It’s also definitely not literary fiction, though I’m not sure where it’d fit in genre fiction. Do short (short) stories even have genres?

Anyway, the story is less than 1500 words, and therefore was appropriate for the Writer’s Digest’s now closed Short Short Story Contest.

For me, plots, characters and dialogue carry a lot of value. And I hope I was able to reflect this on this particular story. There is a clear beginning and end, a specific problem that turns out to be a tad ironic and a somewhat relatable character that did something very irrational.

I’m really fond of the story, and since contests are typically long shots, I’ll be researching for other contests and potential markets until the results come out.

Wish me luck.

May inspiration and luck be with you when it comes to your stories, and their publication:)

So have you written short stories?

Chicken Poetry — Not to contradict my own title or anything, but I actually enjoyed this “joke” on poetry. Apparently I do enjoy poetry humor or funny poetry.

I have never heard from another writer that he/she doesn’t like poetry. Frankly, I haven’t met that many people who openly admit that they don’t like poetry either. This may make me look bad, but it is OK. I’ve always been honest with you. Here it is: I don’t enjoy poetry. And I really tried to like it.

Right from elementary school, my teachers pushed poetry as the noblest medium. From middle school and onwards, I had the chance to read many, many poems by a diversity of poets, in very different styles and I just couldn’t enjoy it. They just didn’t resonate with me.

For some reason, poetry never sounded natural to me. I always sensed a touch of pretense, the desire to show life more painful than it had to be, the desire to sound profound and educated and charismatic rather than sincere and heartfelt.

I am not saying the poets who wrote those poems weren’t sincere. I’m however saying that they did feel artificial to me, and after all, whether or not you like something mostly (if not entirely) depends on how it makes you feel.

I have never been a fan of short stories either. For me, a story just doesn’t end in a couple of pages. I know there are a lot of different kinds and word counts and styles, but the effect for me is the same. I don’t get to know the characters enough, I don’t have the time or the opportunity to get to care about them. As a result, I end up forgetting all about it. Best case scenario, I remember how powerful the idea was. But I still have a million questions in my head about characters, the backgrounds, the motives. Not that all questions should be answered, but I’d like to have at least a couple answered.

I’m in no way looking down on these genres or lacking respect towards them. I am just saying that with so many flavors the tea comes in, I just don’t enjoy them all.

How do you feel? And it is completely OK if you always felt close to some or all types of writing. Feel free to share what kind of writing you feel the closest to and why.

So I Wrote My First Short Story (That Wasn’t Required for an English Class)

Am I The Only Writer Who Doesn’t Like Poetry?