Why not have a go at writing some flash fiction this Christmas?

You will have come across very short stories, I’m sure. They can be called Flash Fiction, Sudden Fiction, Mini Sagas or Short Shorts. They range in length, from a few words to a few hundred. I like to play with about 150 words.

A great example of flash fiction pushed to the extreme, is this six word story (claimed to be the work of Earnest Hemingway):

"For sale: baby shoes, never worn."

We are not told the whole story, but we can work it out from the clues. The heartbreak is not described, but implied and so much more powerful for that. Less is more when it comes to writing.

If you like stories and you fancy trying your hand at writing, flash fiction is a good place to start and a great way to share your work. We are all story tellers, it’s in our bones. Sadly, we lose our confidence as we grow up. I’m guessing you wouldn’t hesitate to take a photograph and then, if you liked it, share that with friends, perhaps get it framed and have it on display in your house? Well, why shouldn’t you do the same with words?

You can use and distribute your stories as you would a photograph. Send them out as text messages, post them on Facebook, print them off and frame them, or create a hand-made book and give it to someone as a gift.

You can write them quickly. Carry a notebook. Scribble down ideas. On a train, in a queue, in waiting rooms or last thing at night, before you drop off to sleep. Pay attention to the world and share your response.

When I look back at my flash fiction, it’s like browsing an album of photographs, triggering memories, conjuring moments from the past. Words allow you to inhabit the moment far more effectively than a photograph. You can smell, hear, feel, as well as see. Think of a memory you’d like to share with someone you love this Christmas. Describe that moment in detail. Send it to them. Give them that memory, gift wrapped in your words.

How To Write Flash Fiction:

1. Think small and grow.

Focus on a small idea, a moment, a detail and explore it. Be precise. Use all your senses. A photograph shows us what the eye can see, but a story can tell you how it smells, what you can hear, how it feels.

2. Don’t overcrowd.

There isn’t time to describe characters when writing shorts. Even a name may not be useful in a micro-story unless it conveys a lot of additional story information or saves you words elsewhere.

3. Arrive late and get out early.

You don't have time in this very short form to set scenes and build character. Jump to the middle and start there, then jump out again.

4. Make your last line ring like a bell.

The last line doesn’t have to complete the story, but must leave us with something to think about. The real story goes beyond the words you’ve put on the page and continues to resonate.

5. Make your title work.

Use these extra words to tell us something additional and essential. There is no room for repetition.

6. Write long, then go short.

Plant a seed and give it the space to go wild. Then take out the pruning shears and cut, cut, cut. See how little you can get away with and then allow it bloom in the imagination of your reader.

Here are some great Christmas short stories written by people attending Zosia's Christmas writing workshops.

Birth day by Caroline Gilfillan

A final snip of yellow wool and you’ve completed shoes for feet that have never touched the ground.

Phone rings. Yes!

Frost scraped off the windscreen as a few shy stars wave you down the road to Furness General.

Heart sings along with carols.

God daughter.

Santa’s New Post by Kirstie Pelling

In peak season I used to skim read thousands of letters an hour. Deciphering the scribble of ‘I want Scrabble.’ Double checking believers. Ordering rocking horses from carpentry and teddies from textiles. Then on Christmas Eve, plotting out how to be everywhere at once.

I was flattered when he came to me personally. The world’s richest man talked of competition, modernisation and the Monopoly Commission. (Sadly not that kind of Monopoly!) He promised me the earth, saying I could be part of a global business. I already had the earth, if only once a year. Now I have targets.

I sold my house in the North Pole and moved to where I always wanted to be. I don't stuff brown boxes or prioritise Prime; I’m part of customer services, working from home. These days it's all digital. They put me in charge of Wish Lists. Read, reply, delete, repeat...

My Wish List? World peace. And the iPhone X.

Being Good at Christmas by David Clancy

‘Let’s do the presents, then, walk the dog’, said Kiest, draining his buck’s fizz.

Grinning like a fool I mimed holding a games console controller; for ages, I’d been hinting at a PlayStation. I’d never really been a gamer, and years earlier, when skint, we’d happily pawned my Sega for a Chinese and a pot of paint. However, now, I wanted a pastime.

His first: a blue John Smedley jumper, totally conservative, except the price.

Then mine: under the wrapping was an unbranded box. . . odd?

Deeply furrowed, I opened it.

Wellies!

Green, dog walking, Hunter, wellies. Men’s, size 8.

Two months earlier, the Army and Navy Stores had size 8 only in women’s. Impatient Kiest, had bought himself a pair. The little Cuban heel gave him height. ‘Like Sarkozy’, people said. He’d grown to hate them.

Getting ready for our walk, he said, ‘Fancy swapping wellies?’.

Christmas by Margaret Clancy

A conspiracy to keep women busy.

Ghost Stories by Katie Hale

It was on nights like this, dark and prickling, that she’d told the boys ghost stories. Those were the old days, before the boys disappeared, one by one, from the big house, before they dropped away like pine needles to leave her bare and branching, shivering at small noises.

She tugs at the heavy curtains, her reflection suspended in the dark beyond.

As she lifts the tray from the oven to cool on the rack, the kitchen is full of the smell of creation, buttery and yellow, and she holds it inside her like a flame. She runs her fingertips across their small gingerbread bodies and closes her eyes. The flame inside her flickers like a candle in a power cut, then goes out.

Ghosts of Christmas Past by Zosia Wand

Unwrapping frosted glass baubles that were crafted by artists before I was born. Dressing the tree, as my mother did before me. My youngest daughter, face lit by fairylights, exclaims, “I dreamed of this.”

So did I.

Christmas Visit by Caroline Gilfillan

How long had it been? How many years? She’d meditated in Nepalese temples, danced beside the Ganges, tracked tigers in Myanmar. But she’d had to come home eventually. Don’t we all? With her she’d brought gifts of cedar, incense, glittering jade.

The hardy sheep and wintry light of the Bay had filled her with unsettling hope.

But two grey-haired imposters stood at the door of her house, faces spangled by the tree lights spilling from the window. Where were her parents?

And now the man was walking slowly towards her, reaching out his hands. The long bones of his fingers ran a shiver up her spine. She recalled a harsh fever one Christmas Eve, and a palm stroking her hair. The scent of pine.

A flame burned bright in her heart.

‘Is it you? Is it really you?’