The Way-Tougher-Than-Microfiction Challenge (Europe, MEA)

Microfiction challenges you to concise stories of a couple hundred words in length. That’s often tough to do. But then there’s the mini-saga, which reduces the word count even further, to about 50 words. That’s even more tough.

This month, though, we’re going to take concision even further. We’re not going to ask you to write a story that fits into a word count. No, we’re going to ask you to write a complete, traditional narrative in just Protected content .

A traditional narrative structure is said to have four parts:

1. Introduction or exposition: Where you establish characters, settings, and the context in which these exist.
2. Complication: Where you introduce a challenge or a problem
3. Climax: The high point where your very brief story’s action leads.
4. Resolution: Where you wrap everything up in a neat, concise conclusion.

We suggest that your writing should hint at a larger story that expands off the page, but is nonetheless a complete four-part narrative. Bonus points if you avoid dream sequences.

Good luck.

(PS: for reference, the above description totals 1,022 characters.)