A gathering of recent speculative flash & micro fiction, each presenting a tiny-yet-powerful universe. How tiny? About one-thousand words for flash; four-hundred words for micro. The word count isn’t as important as the emotion, the adventure, the sense of wonder. Including science fiction, fantasy, horror, and the spaces in between.
If you love these stories as much as I do, please share them so others can discover these brilliant authors!
By Lindz McLeod in Hex Literary * 929 Words
There’s a drop of something beaded and bright just under the tiger’s eye. A tear, but not his. Somebody loved him enough to weep over his death.
This story begins with a resurrected mammoth selling caskets to bereaved humans and then proceeds to break your heart multiple times. The language is artful and vibrant. I wanted to reach through my screen and hug these characters—and I want everyone to read this story.
Five Answers to Questions You Probably Have
By John Wiswell In Uncanny * 904 words
No matter how angry you may feel at your mom and her family, you know they’re all smart people.
Except for your grandma.
As always, Wiswell brings the big emotions with a deeply complex “monster.” The format of this piece works beautifully, both the list setup and the strikeout text, propelling the reader along. You might want to read this story twice to fully appreciate the humor.
The Last Thing They See Is Laika
By Stephen Geigen-Miller in Lightspeed * 974 words * Audio available
It’s all down to physics, as usual. Force, kinetic energy, and gravity.
Well, sure, just make me cry.
By Albert Chu in Small Wonders * 991 words
Magic flows out of Eloïse in glimmering sheets, and her simple tunic dissolves. In its place, she molds the magic into a shining cuirass, a pair of gleaming pauldrons, sleek gauntlets to encase her forearms.
Issues of being seen and showing your true self are at the heart of this fantasy piece. It’s hard to not love the title character.
By Wendy Nikel in Metastellar * 752 words
When I get the call for a Code 43, I have to pull my truck over and consult my Codex of Supernatural Beasts and Cryptids to make sure I’m not mistaken.
This is absolutely fun! I dare you to read this and not smile! (Bonus points to Nikel for working “Codex” into the narrative so smoothly.)
By Meg Pokrass in The McNeese Review * 598 words
We were not made to last, he says.
How can we not become sour? I ask.
This surrealist piece embraces ambiguity, leaving multiple intriguing questions to ponder. No matter how you decide to view the story, I believe it’s impossible to come away without considering anew the concepts of love and belonging and the horrors that come with a lack of freedom.
By Lyndsie Manusos in Hex Literary * 989 words
They are not our friends, someone wrote, when we were all rooting for boats to sink. Let them giggle. Let them squeal. We thought, oh finally, nature was doing the work for us, and we didn’t have to try so hard anymore.
Haunting images in this complex story, with notes of what it is to be othered in the violent reality of our everyday lives.
By Franky Seymour in Factor Four * 998 words
I can feel it all, in the back of my mind: the sterile room and its blinking screens, but it’s distant, like the sense of a storm on the horizon or the magnetic pull of a passing planet.
I’m always drawn to transhumanist tales. This piece’s narrator is the perfect guide, showing the process in economical prose that brings a sense of disconnection and longing. A compelling exploration of the boundary between human and not-human.
By Jordan Hirsch in Radon Journal * 677 words
Her son’s hands: now fabricated skin to feel human, their warmth generated not from the homeostasis of a body surviving but from the whirring of a machine.
I’m a sucker for a good title, and even though this is only a single word, it conveys a complex set of emotions. Hirsch does a beautiful job of capturing a mother’s familiarity with her son’s behaviors in this lovely transhumanist moment.
By Grace Brannan in Flash Point SF * 999 words
With one look, I could tell the senator was dead.
The knife sticking out of his chest was a pretty good indication.
I enjoyed this more than I should have. Necromancy and faulty resurrections could explain a lot about DC politics, couldn’t it?
By Chelsea Stickle in Fractured Lit * 252 words
Now that the Arctic isn’t cold anymore, The Blob is awake and tearing through malls like a post-breakup trust fund baby.
Stickle packs a lot of punch into this micro. The Blob coming alive and taking over is a fun idea (I think it’s fun), but each time I read this piece, I find new layers of frustration and sorrow.
By Mar Vincent in Small Wonders * 1009 words
I’m breaking out in the shape of the Big Dipper. Ursa Major, the Great Bear, rears rampant on my right cheek.
Who ever dreamed celestial acne could be so sweet?
Myna Chang 