Customer Reviews

Long Story Short: Flash Fiction by Sixty-five of North Carolina’s Finest Writers

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This is a great idea for a book. These stories are really short, but most of them are complete, that is, they are real stories, they go somewhere. Some of them are memorable. There is one by a former student of Gingher's(the editor of the book, Marianne Gingher) who's now a playwright, and her story about her brother going off to Iraq is unforgettable. The novelist Lawrence Naumoff has a funny/so real story about "trust fund revolutionaries" from the 1970s, I think, and there are stories by major literary names like Russell Banks, and then some people you've never heard of, but, oddly, or, not oddly, their stories are just as good if not better than the famous people. I'm glad it's in paperback--it's affordable.

This volume, albeit short, is well worth the inexpensive price if you love flash fiction. Since I do love flash fiction, I could not wait to get it and read it. Each short, short story is a moment in time and captures the impact of that moment beautifully. While some of the stories are better than others, they are all worth the read and the reread. Flash fiction is very short fictional writing, in case you are unfamiliar with the term.

Ranging from less than half a page to most of five pages, this collection's sixty-five snapshot stories run flash fiction's gamut of possibilities. Realism or nightmares, literary or speculative, historic or contemporary or futuristic, this collection offers them all. It has a furious positive energy that propels you from page to page, and its stories are sharp enough to keep you awake at night pondering what you just read.

Like the best novels, this collection lingers long after you put it down and move on. And like the radio, if you don't like what's on now, stay with it for a few minutes and something new will arrive. I recall only two stories I wish had baked just a little longer; and the other stories are profound and moving enough to compensate for those two little slips.

It's a shame book buyers don't choose short story collections, because this anthology of subtle, incisive little nuggets deserves wider reading. Like real life, flash fiction comes at you in a hurry and leaves you thinking. It may be serious or funny, happy or sad, but it's always surprising and disconcerting. In an overcrowded book market, this small and witty collection doesn't draw attention, but it does leave its mark.