Don’t over-think word countsĭon’t worry too much about rules, about how long the perfect piece of flash fiction should be, or the perfect short story. Now use your favourite list or part of a list to start your story. List-making helps to get the writing mind working it frees you up to play, to be a bit silly, to relax. There’s a tendency to want to nail that opening from the first sentence and this can stop you from writing anything at all. Often the most daunting thing about writing a short story is starting, getting some words on the page. Write a list of all the different kinds of ways you can cook a chicken or get a baby to drink from a bottle. Lists of things that scare you, things that make you laugh and things that make you cry. George Saunders once said, ‘when you read a short story, you come out a little more aware and a little more in love with the world around you’ …but what is the best way to start? We asked Lynne Bryan – writer, editor and creative writing tutor for NCW, the Arvon Foundation and the University of East Anglia – for the most important advice she would offer when embarking on your first journey into the short story form.
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