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1. One Page Stories
Or Flash Fiction Submissions.
or
What To Do, What To Write And How to Submit
instructions by GF Willmetts
This is an experiment on the website for all of
you writers and neo-writers out there. One of
the criticisms that I raise when working my way
through our slush pile is that writers need to
learn how to tell a story with a limited word
count, like short stories, to make everything
count and tell a good story. You can't get much
shorter than a one page or flash fiction story.
As there are few places and hardcopy magazines
around to give a chance, we're going to run this
here and see how it goes. If you can get the mechanics
of storycraft sorted out at this level, it will
make bigger pieces easier to write.
To this end, we're offering space to print one
page or flash fiction stories. Anything that falls
outside of the rules below will be rejected with
minimal explanation just in case I'm getting too
many at a time but it will indicate where any
weaknesses lie and what you need to focus on to
sort it out for future stories. If longer, try
submitting them as short stories instead where
you'll have a little more space.
The Rules:-
1. You can send a flash fiction story as part
of your email to me. Your story should NOT be
sent as an attachment but pasted into the normal
reply box. Ensure you keep a copy of your story
at your end with a simple introduction of who
you are. SFCrowsnest take no responsibility for
lost stories. In the subject box, type 'One
Page Story'.
2. Story must have a title and author name as
well as your email and terrestrial address - these
will be omitted, unless asked otherwise, should
the story be accepted.
3. Although not necessarily hardcopied, think
of the layout. The story can be single-lined but
must not extend beyond the length of an A4 page
with borders 2cm (1inch) except left hand side
which is 3cm (1 1/2inch) or a maximum of 650 words.
I don't care if it's a word or a sentence beyond
this length, this has to be obeyed. Part of the
objective lesson of this exercise is to keep the
word count down and tight to fit A4 size.
4. Read the rules of grammar and get them as perfect
as possible. Set your Word Processor for English
(United Kingdom). It can be tagged to one particular
story and you can go back to whatever you use
in your own country with other documents. Treat
this as part of the exercise cos you do do this
when submitting to other countries, don't you?
5. Apply standard text format. All paragraphs
start with two spaces and there is no need to
drop a line between paragraphs.
6. Check out the guidelines as run on the website
submissions to see what other foibles I normally
like to see, especially regarding speech marks.
LINK: The Problems I See Most When Looking At
Samples
7. Be original!!! Any plagiarism or borrowing
of copyrighted characters from elsewhere is grounds
for instant return.
8. Minimal editing correction will be at editor's
discretion and shown to writer before being released
on the website. All copyright remains with the
writer and it can act as part of your writer's
CV.
9. Editor's decision is final.
Easy to follow instructions. There are two stories
that can be read already in different styles.
It's up to you as a writer to decide how you will
treat your own ideas when converting them into
a story. There is already some flash fiction on
the website but treat as examples rather than
techniques to copy.
E-mail to me at (and read the email address and
remove the words that are used to purge spam to
the abyss): gfwillmetts@hotmailspamremover.com
GF Willmetts
submissions editor: SFCrowsnest.co.uk
July 2005
More details
Guidelines for would-be
daily newsfeed journalists
Guidelines for
flash fiction submissions
Guidelines
for short and long fiction submissions
Guidelines for
book and movie review submissions
The problems
Geoff sees most when looking at samples
Summary: contributor
guidelines
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