Getting Started with Micro-fiction

the drabble template that has never let me down

I love micro-fiction. I first discovered it through a writer friend who sent me a call for submissions for Black Hare Press. They were looking for drabbles, or short stories of exactly 100 words. I was intrigued, and ended up selling 30 drabbles to them between 2019-2021.

I designed the following drabble template when I was teaching undergraduates at a small liberal arts school in Ohio. For extra credit, students could write a drabble and submit it for 1/2 a letter grade markup on their midterm or final. Bonus: if they were accepted, they’d be able to add “Published Author” to their resume. Needless to say, in my four years teaching, a lot of students took me up on the challenge. In one class, every student achieved publication using this template.

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Template:

<opening image/hook that establishes genre & central conflict>. <World/Scene Specific image>. <Character wants/Misbelief/central issue>. <Ground character in scene using immersive language>. <Promise of action>. <Progression of Action>. <Character Humanization>. <Growth/hint at growth>.

Example:

Ohio-1 (first published in Black Hare Press’s “Dark Worlds” anthology, 2019)

The Avadiin ships swarm around our cruiser like an Oort cloud. We launch from the hangar, sixty of us in T-23 Dragonfly fighters, painted black. Orange sunburst emblems blaze on the quad wings. 

I don’t want to die.

Technicolor lasers streak through the starfield. I sit in my blinking cockpit, sweating despite the climate control, waiting for orders. It was just us out here, the Io garrison. Then Mars’ if we broke. 

“Ready, Ohio-1?” Betsy’s voice is calm. Our squad forms up on my wing. 

I touch the vidscreen mounted on the Dragonfly’s dash. My son smiles at me.

“Ready.”

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What’s really tough about micro-fiction is that every element of good story telling and genre conventions must be present in very limited space. Here, I’ve decided that I’d use no more than one sentence for each part of the template except describing the setting, because setting is such a big part of sci-fi. Below, I’ve included a highlighted version of both the template and the example drabble to show which sentences correlate with the template.

But, writing the actual piece is only half the battle. Thinking up an idea that can be contained within 100 words while still being interesting is a challenge all by itself.

As an example:

The year is 3215, humans have colonized Titan and Enceladus. A young scientist with a dark past experiments with dangerous nanotechnology, which allows the user to implant memories of deceased persons into their own brain.

Genre: Cyberpunk/Sci-fi

Setting Inspiration: Enceladus

Let’s break this prompt down into 4 categories:

1. The character → The scientist with the dark past

2. The technology → nanotech that implants memories

3. The plot device → the memories themselves

4. The Setting → Enceladus

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The scientist with the dark past

• Ask yourself the following questions:

  • What is the scientist’s motivation for implanting the memories?

    • Financial? Personal?

  • Why does he want to implant it? 

    • Is he looking for an answer to a scientific question? 

    • Is he looking for an answer to a personal question?

  • What are the consequences for the scientist?

    • What is he risking

      • Damage to his mind/personal health?

      • Professional ramifications?

    • What is at stake?

      • What happens if he cannot transfer the memories?

        • Are the consequences limited to his personal goals?

        • Or are there global ramifications? 

      • What happens if he DOES transfer the memories?

        • Is there any gain/loss to him personally 

        • Are there any negative consequences?

The Nanobot Technology

• How does it work? (pseudoscience is OK here)

• Is there a cost to going through this procedure, monetary or otherwise? 

• What does the apparatus that administers the nanobots look like?

  • Is it a machine? A syringe? Is this technology organic or inorganic? 

    • If it’s a syringe, what is the carrier fluid? 

    • If it’s a computer, is there a model on the screen of the memory? 

• Have there been any gruesome mistakes with this technology in other experiments? 

• Who has funded the experiment/development of this tech?

  • Is it a benevolent or malevolent corporation/entity? 

• How has the scientist gained access to the lab? Is he rushing or does he have time to check his work? 

• How are the memories stored? 

• Does implanting memories hurt? 

The Memories Themselves

• Who did the memories belong to? A family member? A colleague? A former lover?

  • How would the person feel about the scientist stealing their memories?

• Why does he want to implant it? Is he looking for an answer to a scientific question? Something from his past?

• Is the memory even from a human? An animal? An alien? Has the scientist found a way to access the in-organic “planetary memory” of the Earth/solar system itself?

• Can the body reject the memories, like bodies sometimes reject organ transplants? 

• What are the limits/consequences of doing this? Do the memories fade quickly? Are they incorporated into a person’s own memory, eventually? 

• What is the quality? Sharp/clear or fuzzy/blurry? Are any of the 5 senses missing? What about emotion?

Setting: Enceladus

• Enceladus is a frozen ice world with a subsurface ocean. Surface temperatures average -330 degrees Fahrenheit. 

• Is the lab on the surface or is it in an underwater facility? 

• Is there a window in the lab? What’s visible outside

  • If it’s underwater, remember, sunlight can only penetrate about 200m below the surface of water. Are there lights that illuminate the surroundings? 

• Is there  other intelligent life? 

• The 5 senses

  • What does the lab

    • Look like

    • Smell like

    • Sound like

    • The air on Enceladus is not fit for breathing. Does the recycled air taste a certain way? Metallic? Like cleaner/chemicals?

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Obviously, all this pre-work won’t make it into your drabble, but asking yourself these questions could be a jumping-off point for a much longer short story — or even a novel. Additionally, especially if you’re writing sci-fi, having answers to all these questions could help you decide what type of story you want to tell: experiment gone wrong? Emotional re-connection with a loved one? Space disaster? Villain origin story? The dangers of new technology? The possibilities are pretty much endless.

Finally, we have to talk about revision, which deserves a series of posts all by itself. Personally, I always end up writing too much and have to cut words. Here are three tricks to add punch to your prose while keeping your word count down.

• Cutting “Filter words” saves space and deepens immersion

  • Eliminate “He saw, he felt, he smelled, he heard”

• Cut instances of “seemed” or “almost”

  • “The ocean seemed to undulate with the wind, almost like a witch churned it in her cauldron”

    • 17 words

      • Did it “seem” or did it “actually”

      • “Almost churning” is a non-descriptor. If it “almost” did something, then it “actually” did something else

  • The ocean undulated with the wind, like a witch churning her cauldron.

    • 12 words 

• Adding metaphorical language can cut words

  • The witching wind churned the ocean, undulating in its cauldron seabed

    • 11 words

And that’s it! Send a DM or comment with any questions. Take a look at Black Hare Press’s submission page for upcoming anthologies as well.