Toujours Voir

AUTHOR’S NOTES

There is a sub-subgenre of writing called the “precision short story”… a fable written to very exacting standards. One type of precision story is the 250-word tale.

The rule is simply this. The story must be 250 words in length. Not one word longer, not one word shorter. And it must work as a story.

It is like pulling teeth. Like using a tiny pick to make one of those incredible, interlocking Chinese ivory puzzles. Frustrating!

My solution (and not a very elegant one, I admit) was to use a lot of polysyllabic words and hyphenated contractions. My only excuse is that I was trying to cover a pretty complex idea in a very short space.

To this day I shake my head over this one.

(Neuroconvulsive hyperdrive? Ooooh.)