If you've been looking to hone your writing chops (not to mention, your imagination), composing micro-fiction is often a good exercise.
These "short" short stories offer a great avenue for practicing narrative writing, apart from improving your ability to fashion words cohesively.
Often consisting of 300 words or less, micro-fiction is often challenging because of the lack of space.
Without the luxury of building up characters and scenes over many paragraphs, you're forced to jump right into the action, craftily weaving your words to let the reader fill in the blanks.
It goes without saying, even a short piece needs to be run through by a good writing software.
Want to try your hand writing micro-fiction? Here's a quick guide.
Keep everything small.
Choose one brief story with once central plot, one main character and a handful (preferably three or less) supporting actors.
There isn't space to elaborate on much, so the less you involve in it, the better.
Jump right into the action.
Forget introspection, feelings and backstories - jumpstart the narrative by beginning it right in the thick of the action.
It hooks the reader immediately and gives the piece forward momentum.
Get the reader invested right at the first paragraph.
You'll need to create intrigue immediately.
You know how good writing eventually creates questions in the readers' mind that compels them to read through to the end - you'll do that too, right from the get-go.
End it powerfully.
Being short, the real impact of a piece of micro-fiction happens squarely at the end.
Use a twist, a shocking revelation or a surprising finish to end it on a high note.