The Art of Brevity: Crafting the Very Short Story

by Grant Faulkner, Megan Giddings (Foreword by)

Overview

With increased compression, every word, every sentence matters more. A writer must learn how to form narratives around caesuras and crevices instead of strings of connections, to move a story through the symbolic weight of images, to master the power of suggestion.

With elegant prose, deep readings of other writers, and scaffolded writing exercises, The Art of Brevity takes the reader on a lyrical exploration of compact storytelling, guiding readers to heighten their awareness of not only what appears on the page but also what doesn’t.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780826364746
Publisher:	University of New Mexico Press
Publication date:	02/15/2023
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	192
Sales rank:	575,981
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Grant Faulkner is the executive director of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and the cofounder of 100 Word Story. His work has been widely anthologized in flash-fiction collections, and he is the author of several books, including All the Comfort Sin Can Provide, Fissures, and Nothing Short of 100: Selected Tales from 100 Word Story.

Table of Contents

Foreword
Megan Giddings
Acknowledgments
Introduction. Going Long. Going Short.

Chapter 1. Thirteen Ways of Looking at Flash Fiction
Chapter 2. The Freedom of Constraints
Chapter 3. Telling a Story in Fragments
Chapter 4. The Erotics of Brevity
Chapter 5. Context: How Much Is Enough?
Chapter 6. The Fullness of Omission
Chapter 7. White Spaces
Chapter 8. Plotting in Miniature (and with a Slant)
Chapter 9. Writing Characters in Fleeting Profile
Chapter 10. Writing for the Essence
Chapter 11. The Sounds of Silence
Chapter 12. Found Objects, Found Stories
Chapter 13. Story as Collage
Chapter 14. Going Small to Go Big: The Art of Expansion
Chapter 15. Going Small to Go Small
Chapter 16. The Poetics of Brevity
Chapter 17. Is It Poetry or Prose?
Chapter 18. How Short Can You Go?
Chapter 19. The Mot Juste
Chapter 20. The Sentence
Chapter 21. The Paragraph
Chapter 22. The Title
Chapter 23. The "Flash Novel" and the Novella
Chapter 24. Endings

Postscript
One More Postscript
Flashings: Quotes on Writing Short
Appendix. Gleanings from The Art of Brevity

Editorial Reviews

12/12/2022

These meditative reflections from Faulkner (All the Comfort Sin Can Provide), executive director of National Novel Writing Month, consider the merits of flash fiction. “Our lives are as much about the unspoken as the spoken,” Faulkner contends, waxing poetic on short stories and imparting advice on how to write them. Flash fiction, he posits, works by calling attention to the “spectral blank spaces” around “stray moments,” highlighting the fleeting sensations of everyday experiences, and subverting any pretense to “comprehensiveness and finality.” He offers exercises for composing “tiny stories,” suggesting readers try telling a story in 100 words, capturing a character’s day in seven moments, or spinning a yarn based on emails in one’s spam folder. Enlightening aphorisms from famous authors are peppered throughout, such as poet Robert Southey’s advice, “If you would be pungent, be brief; for it is with words as with sunbeams—the more they are condensed, the deeper they burn.” The exercises are creative, and Faulkner’s dissections of short stories offer revealing glimpses into the many possibilities afforded by the format, such as when he holds up Lydia Davis’s “A Double Negative” to demonstrate how she uses the eponymous technique to sow doubt and suspense. This makes a convincing case for keeping it short. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

"Absolutely essential reading on the power and craft of very short stories. Worth it for the brilliant analysis of narrative and poetics, worth it for Faulkner's playfulness and obvious joy on the page, worth it for the string of fascinating quotations at the end. A generous book, packed full, it is bound to be a classic."—Deb Olin Unferth, author of Revolution: The Year I Fell in Love and Went to Join the War

"This makes a convincing case for keeping it short."—Publishers Weekly

"Grant Faulkner, one of our finest practitioners of the very short story, gifts us with this creative, dynamic craft book. The Art of Brevity is absorbing, whimsical, and filled with the eclectic wisdom of writers, artists, and musicians who have created with an aesthetic of brevity and omission. But finally, it is Faulkner's unique, personal view on the subject of condensing short prose—as he telescopes into the fascinating 'cracks and crevices' of brevity—that makes this book a must-have for every writer's shelf."—Tara Lynn Masih, editor of The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Fiction: Tips from Editors, Teachers, and Writers in the Field

"What a what wonderful book for writers and readers of short stories! Part craft, part meditation on form, it's entirely delightful, practical, and will leave any reader with a deeper appreciation of flash fiction."—Amber Sparks, author of And I Do Not Forgive You: Stories and Other Revenges

"In this manic world of noise and delirium, our ability to comprehend reality bends toward chaos. In brief cracks of lucidity, we scramble, hungry to purchase happiness or at least consciousness. This text is a mighty testament to the zeitgeist, an important recognition of flash as art, and a needle into our self-awareness, reflection, and clarity."—Venita Blackburn, author of How to Wrestle a Girl: Stories

From the Publisher