Week 10 Lab: Learn About Microfiction

 -Being able to write a microfiction means being able to distill your story to the very key elements, and then typing it out in a few sentences. For example, in The Lion's Share, the first two sentences set up the the characters at play, and where they were, and what had already happened. Then, the plot of the story climaxes in the next sentence followed by the final sentence being the conclusion for the story. No room for error, but well-written words to deliver the message.

-The Tiny Love Stories from The New York Times is interesting, since they cover a variety of topics while being tied to love. A short story I read called Teacher of the Year was moving, capturing the love of high school students for their teacher within the few sentences used to explain her situation. One sentence containing their act of devotion highlighted this notion quickly.

-NPR's "Hint Fiction" is great because of the element of mystery the stories hold, since the tiny window of storytelling means things have to be left to the imagination of the reader. It's like a bunch of little hooks but with no story to follow up, leaving the reader wanting more.

-The shorter these stories get, the more impactful they are, because of how much meaning is packed into the tale. NPR's article on Six-Word Stories holds a lot of good ones, like the classic sad tale "For Sale: baby shoes, never worn." A statement like this leaves room for the reader to interpret the situation and realize the gravity by recognizing the events that led up to the creation of that statement, and processing the outcome, which was a tragedy in this scenario. Another statement, "Acting is not all I am", is a cry from someone to be seen as more than their role, wanting to express themselves rather than staying confined to a role in society.

-Reddit's Two-Sentence Horror subreddit is an enjoyable read because their stories hold the same element of mystery and leave the same amount of interpretation up to the reading as Hint Fiction, except with a horror focus. A story about a student following safety rules leading to a terrible mistake reminded me why I enjoyed reading internet horror stories, as it nailed the effect of a vague ending where the fate of the protagonist is unknown. 

Simple, but effective at creating fear, much like the two sentence horror stories