Thank you to author Scotty Cornfield for providing me with a copy of Fast Fiction: 101 Stories – 101 Words Each in exchange for this honest review.
Volume one of Fast Fiction is a compilation of author Cornfield’s writing exercises. Given 101 prompts he wrote 101 stories of exactly 101 words each. Sometimes creativity can be even more impressive when placed under constraints.
It is highly likely that at some point in your life you were required to write something with a word count. Countless school essays of 500- 2,000 words minimum have given us all a talent for making sentences longer than they need to be in order to pass an assignment. But have you ever tried to write to an exact word count? I haven’t, but I’m guessing it’s not that easy.
Fast Fiction covers pretty much every genre you could think of and showcases a broad talent that many authors can’t depict with a whole series of novels. It’s a testament to the act of writing itself.
Some stories are memorable and stand out. One of my favorites is entitled “Reading Between the Lies” from the prompt “duplicity.” This 101 word story captures the tumultuous history of a complicated relationship as it comes to a tragic close. All of that is less than one page.
Although many of the short stories are entertaining or interesting at least there are of course others that fall flat. When you have 101 stories there are bound to be some that are not as good as the others. This is often the case with short story books of even 5-10 stories.
There were some that didn’t quite fit my personal tastes, like a different kind of humor than I prefer, and those might be very good for other readers. There is a strong chance of there being at least a couple of stories here to enjoy.
There are also some stories that I just didn’t think fit the prompt. The story “Pushing the Envelope Until the Envelope Pushes Back” was supposed to be based on the prompt “Man-eating vulture bees” but contained no vultures nor bees and not a single man was eaten. Cornfield does take many liberties with the prompts and many of the stories are tangential but this one and a few others were disappointingly off the mark.
The best part of Fast Fiction is how fun it is to read. You can pick it up for a minute at a time, read two or three stories, and put it aside for later. Often, when I had a minute before I had to do something I would intend on reading one but end up reading quite a few more because they just move so quickly and it’s cool to see how the stories are completely different than what you might’ve written for the same prompt.
Go ahead and pick up this collection to read in between longer reading sessions and let me know which one was your favorite.
4/5 stories 📖📖📖📖
in order to keep me up to my ears in books please consider using the following links to purchase this product. it’s at no extra cost to you and would really help me out, thank you and happy reading!
