Today’s blog is guest written by Calum Kerr, writer, founder of Gumbo Press, and associate lecturer at the University of Winchester. He has had articles, stories, and flash-fiction published in a number of journals, magazines and anthologies.
“So, what are you up to these days?”
“Oh, you know. Not much. This and that.”
“How’s the writing going?”
“Well, at the moment I’m writing a short story every day.”
“That’s good. How long have you been doing that?”
“So far, about three and half months.”
“Really?”
“Yep, just another two hundred and fifty seven days to go.”
“What?! Why?”
“Why? Good question. Let me tell you all about it…”
You see, in November last year I took part in NaNoWriMo and completed a 50,000 word novel in a month. I found the whole thing enjoyable and it made me realise that I should be writing a lot more, and a lot more often. So, in January, I took on a project to write 31 flash-fictions, one for every day in the month. It went well, and even turned into a book (www.calumkerr.co.uk/pp014.shtml).
That was even more fun, and as the stories started to be published in other places it occurred to me to extend the project and keep myself writing.
This led, in May, to the beginning of flash365. Here, I am using a different set of prompts each month to write a daily flash-fiction, and the plan is to continue it for a full year, completing 365 stories (well, probably 366 as it will be a leap year, though I might take 29th February off…).
In May, I didn’t have any set prompts, the idea was just to write the stories. I took inspiration from all kinds of places – lines in books, TV programmes and films, events in the news, conversations with friends.
In June I used the 21 short sections of the song ‘Fingertips’ by They Might Be Giants, as well as nine titles from others of their songs.
July was paint colours – specifically using the names of paints from the Dulux range – everything from Mud Hut and Raspberry Diva to Magnolia and Pure Brilliant White, most of which were suggested by people following the project on Facebook.
And now, in August, as parliament are meant to be on holiday and it’s supposed to be a slow news month (I’m sure the riots were started just to knock me off track) I am using news stories as my sources of inspiration.
The different prompts have led to a huge range of different stories, plus I’m trying to be as varied as I can in style, perspective, genre and mood, and I can only imagine future months will add to this range.
In September I shall be piggy-backing on a similar project which uses prompts for poetry, October is Barbara Cartland book titles, November is Old Testament month, and December will see 31 stories created all occurring in the same location at the same time, but all separate.
Then, next year, in January I will be using album titles from Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention as prompts, February uses film titles and March uses international cities (again, suggestions are welcome).
Finally, in April, I shall return to having no set theme for my prompts, writing from whatever emerges, just as I did in May. It will be interesting to see how these differ from those created nearly a year earlier.
Oh, and I’ve managed to do all this while working, moving house, being ill, and just generally living my life. It’s been fascinating, enjoyable, frustrating, tiring, exasperating, liberating and just plain fun. Please come along, have a read, and let me know what you think about the stories and the project in general.
You can find and follow all the stories online, as well as more details on the project and the prompts in use, and if you would like to support the work, you can ‘like’ the page on Facebook, or even buy a copy of 31. Updates can also be found on Twitter by following @flash365tweets.
