Friday Flash Fiction with K.D. Jones

What is flash fiction? It’s an itty bitty story, generally under 1,000 words or 3 printed pages.

I believe all forms of writing strengthen you as a writer. Flash fiction, especially, makes you par down your words and forces you to get to the core of your story. But just because flash fiction is itty bitty doesn’t mean it can’t have meat. All the basics of good story telling still apply to micro fiction; you still need engaging, lively characters, a big problem, emotional depth, good pacing, and so on.

*Please pardon grammar whoopsies. They will be fixed when this story is published in a collection later this year.

“Crystal Corn”

A Fantasy Flash Fiction

By

K. D. Jones

There was a kingdom once known as the Gold Land because nothing would grow there if it wasn’t the color gold. No one knew why this was; they just accepted it without question because their lives were happy and peaceful.

One day, a farmer’s corn crops produced cobs of crystal. “Egads!” cried the old farmer as he pulled back the stiff green leaves. The crystal sparkled in the sunlight, looking perfectly innocent and completely unaware of the distress it was causing the farmer.

He looked around. What if someone saw this? Would he lose his profession? Be mocked by the locals? Or worse, be banned from Gold Land?

He had to cover this up. There must be some way to fix this!

Yet day by day, stalk by stalk appeared, laden with crystals.

“This cannot be!” he cried to his wife one day. “I cannot sell this!”

“Have you tried?” she asked.

“Have you lost your mind? Of course not! No one can find out!”

“Why not?”

“Because this is Gold Land! Crystals are not gold!”

“What if the people of Gold Land like crystals more than gold?”

“They won’t.”

“Have you asked them?”

“No,” he grumbled, crossing his spindly arms.

She chuckled. “Being different isn’t such a bad thing. Maybe this ‘hiccup’ is good. It was getting rather boring around here with all this gold.”

Terrified and convinced it would not work, the old farmer followed his wife’s crazy plan and began to attempt to sell the crystal corn around town. At first he told people he’d been gifted the corn from a traveling, unnamed merchant. After all, he couldn’t possibly tell them the corn was his!

Word rapidly spread, and soon, the corn began to sell. First by the bushel, then by the boxful. When people began bringing carts and loading it up with corn, he told his wife, “It’s working! They love it!”

“Of course they do,” she said. “They were bored.”

“We have more money than ever!”

“And so we shall, all because you were willing to take a risk and be different.”

Writing Tip

Pick a single problem. You won’t have room for subplots, so place your character in an interesting situation, with a “big” problem, and run with that for your entire story. Noticing a pattern here? 1 character; 1 problem.

For more flash fiction tips, see K.D.’s post: 5 Tips for Writing Flash Fiction

K. D. Jones is the epic fantasy pseudonym for young adult author Krystle Jones. Krystle was born and raised in the small, southern town of Tullahoma, Tennessee. Reading and writing have been lifelong passions of hers. In addition to writing, she is passionate about information technology, Etsy, painting, and exercising. She believes you can be whatever you want to be if you’re willing to work hard. She currently lives in the Midwest with her husband and adopted fur babies.

Learn more about K. D. Jones at kdjonesepicfantasy.com.