How Microfiction Improves Your Longform Writing
I write a lot of microfiction these days. I wrote my first drabble (below) on February 29, 2024.
Monday Microfiction: "Reservation"
This week’s microfiction is a 100-word story about a delicious meal.
It took me six months to write another microfiction that I liked, but after that, I was off to the races. Microfics are a fun and illuminating exercise. I’ve gotten pretty good at them, if my progress in this Microfiction Challenge is any indication.
I figured I’d share some of what I’ve learned and how it’s helped my writing in other areas.
Fast Drafting
Fast drafting is about finishing your first draft as quickly as possible without worrying about whether it’s good. The process doesn’t come naturally to me; I have to fight the urge to edit as I write.
However, microfics are, y’know, short. I have found that it’s significantly easier not to worry about how good your first draft sounds when your first draft is, on average, fifty words or so.
Concision
Every word matters. Use as few as possible to make your point. Consider what may be the most famous microfiction:
For sale: baby shoes, never worn.
- Author unknown1
Damn! So much said in so few words. No backstory given; none needed. The color of the shoes? Who cares! Who buys them? Doesn’t matter.
Try looking at one of your longer stories and see if the backstory you provide is really necessary. Maybe your story becomes more compelling with less detail.
Creative Sentence Structure
Because microfictions require concision, extra creativity is called for—break a grammatical rule or two, even.
Consider: “She heard a noise.” vs “A noise, heard.” You’ve only saved one word, but in microfic every word matters.2 This kind of creative sentence structuring can be applied to your longer stories, too. Mixing up your sentence rhythm is always good.
Emotional Efficiency
If you write short stories, you must check out this YouTube video of a guest lecture by Mary Robinette Kowal on flash fiction.
To summarize a key point, tiny stories aim to pack the largest emotional punch in as few words as possible. Once again, every word matters. You don’t have the luxury to wander off on emotional tangents: basically, you’re going to pick one and make it big.
This emotional honing comes in handy when you’re writing longer stories, for although you have the space to explore many emotions, you want to ensure you’re making each one as vivid as possible. Microfiction will help develop that skill.
Genre Experimentation
Perhaps you want to write something you’ve never tried before. Maybe a romance story when you’re used to writing horror, or vice versa. A story of several thousand words can feel like quite a task. However, writing a 100-word story is a great way to test the waters.
If you try microfiction, carry this habit back into your longer work: be cognizant of your story’s emotional center. Microfiction helps you find that quickly; longform gives you more room to explore it.
And when you revise, ask yourself: What do I really need to complete this scene? Are you including unnecessary words? Backstory that isn’t crucial? Things that could be left unsaid? Figure it out.
If you write anything, feel free to share in the comments!
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No, Hemingway didn’t write that.
Also, the second version is terser, which can be beneficial if you’re writing, say, a thriller.