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WELCOME TO MY FLASH FICTION PAGE

NONE OF THESE STORIES IS LONGER THAN 1,000 WORDS AND SEVERAL ARE SIGNIFICANTLY SHORTER.

WHY NOT PUT YOUR FEET UP AND READ ONE IN YOUR COFFEE BREAK?
 FEWER CALORIES THAN A BISCUIT!

And, if these are still too long, take a look at my 99-word micro-fiction on the blog

If you WRITE flash fiction, you might also find this post by LC Lara useful

No Hard Feelings

Ellen would not have followed the path if she’d known it would lead to the graveyard. All those dead people lovingly remembered; all those people who were probably right bastards when they were alive.

Published by Sories for Homes, October, 2017.

Ghost Girl

The other children threw rocks at me, but that was all right when Mama was there to wipe away my tears.

Published by Spelk Fiction, September, 2017.

I Want Doesn't Get

I wanted cheesecake and a chocolate fountain but I didn’t want to pop the button on my best black skirt. I wanted a bronze plaque on a bench beside the bowling green and souvenir service sheets on embossed paper with a photo at the front.


Published by Spelk Fiction, February, 2017.

Out of Her Element

Down she went and down, hand under hand on the guide rope. Where it petered out, she nudged the dial on her buoyancy vest and waited for her husband to emerge from the fog of churned-up sand.

Published by Halfway Down the Stairs, June 2016.

If You Could Do This One Last Thing for Me

You saved me a seat in the lecture hall, because my bus was always late. You persuaded the corner shop to stock gluten-free croissants, so you could serve me breakfast in bed. You cheered louder than anyone at our graduation when I got the trophy and you just scraped a pass.

Published by Pygmy Giant, May 2016 – comments welcome on the website.

All the Time

Trina gulps her coffee and bites into her toast (the teeth-tingling strawberry  jam negating the virtue of the wholemeal bread and thereby triggering the guilt that she never really took advantage of that introductory offer at the gym).  

Published on Flash Fiction Magazine April 2014, where your comments are welcome.

Plastic

Of course, he'd always known the day would come when youth would mock what he had cherished. The clothes in which he'd swaggered down the street. The melodies through which his lust rolled over into love. The idiom that spoke his pleasure, fear, distaste. He'd always known, but now he felt it. Now it hurt.

Published by The Treacle Well, January 2014.

Comments welcome on my blog post on allotment gardening  or on Dirt under the fingernails

A Place of Safety

When she saw the mess they'd made of the flat, the woman posing as a social worker was quick to act.  A glance at the figurines in fragments in the fireplace, the disembowelled television, the trail of blood-red ink across the floor, and she'd whipped out her phone.

Published by Pygmy Giant, December 2013 – comments welcome on the website, or alternatively on my blog post on disorientation.

In Praise of Female Parts

At school they showed us how to put a condom on a cucumber.  You turned to me and said, Urgh!  Could you imagine taking a thing like that inside you?

Published in the USA by Quality Women's Fiction, July 2008 and again in December 2013 by Red Fez

Comments welcome on the blog post The embodied you and me

Peace-and-Quiet Pancake

He shakes his head almost before I've finished speaking. It's his standard response these days: if in doubt, say no.

Published by Flash Fiction Online, November 2013

Comments welcome on the website or on the blog post Whose story is it anyway? or on Food in Fiction

See also my post on Norah Colvin's blog Examining praise: Stephen Grosz – the third instalment!

No Milk or Sugar

Stiff white hairs sprouted from her chin and a splodge of dried-out breakfast cereal graced her lapel like a brooch.  The dominoes were scattered pell-mell  on the table: a three and a one abutting a double-six would never have passed muster in the game she'd taught me. 

Published by Flash Fiction World , July 2013. Republished on Flash Fiction Magazine April 2014.

To comment on this story, please do so on the publisher's website or at my blog post on dementia or on disorientation in general.

The Japanese Garden

I want to ask Wilma whether she fancies one of those bamboo water-features where the water goes round in perpetual motion, but she's intent on telling me about some woman at work who was having an affair with a neighbour right under her husband's nose.

First published in print in 2007 by Carillon and now online by Fiction on the Web, July 2013, where you are welcome to leave comments or, alternatively, you can do so on the blog at Is Writing like Gardening or at Food in Fiction

Betrayed

I used to pride myself on being a sound judge of character.  That was before I got embroiled with Whitney. 

Published by Flash Fiction World , June 2013, and again on Flash Flood for National  Flash Fiction Day, 21 June, 2014

To comment on this story, please do so on the website or call in at the blog. 

All Night, the Babby

Ma takes vodka to help her sleep through. I said, Why divn’t you give some of that to the babby?

Published by Pygmy Giant, November 2012

To comment on this story, please go to the website or call in at the blog. 

Bathroom Suite

I did not go to school today but you must not worry. I am not sick.

Published by Pygmy Giant, November 2012 and in an Hungarian translation, August 2013.

Comments welcome on the site or on annecdotal, Who Gives a Shit for World Toilet day, where some of the issues behind the story are explored.

Or see here for an uplifting real-life antidote.

Or this post for yet another angle School: a suitable place for fiction?

Yoko Sits Silently on Stage While the Audience Snips off Her Clothes

Canny job that, I thought. Sitting on your backside watching people look at paintings. A uniform with gold buttons and epaulettes.

Published by Pygmy Giant, May 2012

Getting It Together With Elvis

After the party, when she saw their toothbrushes kissing in an old mug on his bathroom shelf, she felt all shook up. The bristles of her pink toothbrush enmeshed with the chewed hairs of his blue one was too much too soon.

Published by Pygmy Giant, June 2012

You can comment on this story on the website or on my blogpost A Flash (or Two) of Musical Inspiration.

And the Winner is ...

It is said that when someone is drowning they see their whole life pass before their eyes.  I once had a boyfriend who was obsessed with that idea.  He wanted to know what it would feel like, what thoughts would go through a person's mind when they came to watch the ultimate biopic. 
I ditched him, of course.

Published by Foliate Oak in 2009 and nominated for the Pushcart Prize and again by Flash Fiction Magazine in January 2015

To comment on this story, see my post 5 Writers on Failure

The Wilsons go Shopping

I had been trying to get a system going -- a bag for the vegetables, one for baked stuff, another for booze, and so on -- but it doesn’t work; Dad’s too chaotic ...

First published on beat the dust, June 2008, now revived on Flash Fiction Magazine March 2014, where your comments are welcome.

You might also like to see my blog post Good Grief for Writers that connects with this story.

George and Pat For Ever
Shh, it’s okay: the long-ago voice of her mother when her screams had summoned her to banish a childhood nightmare. 

My first fiction publication: January 2007 in Pen Pusher 
Now revived by Fiction on the Web, October 2013, where you are welcome to leave your comments

You might also like to see my blog post Good Grief for Writers that connects with this story.