OCR is Not the Only Font

Introduction

Where to begin? The obvious answer, “at the beginning,” would suggest July 1st, 2012: the first day of Flash Fiction Month. Heard of it? Until the 27th of June, I hadn’t either.

Flash Fiction Month is a little bit like National Novel Writing Month. But while the aim of NaNoWriMo is to produce a novel in a month, Flash Fiction Month demands the completion of thirty-one separate stories: one each and every day. It’s like NaNoWriMo’s little brother. More accurately, it’s like NaNoWriMo’s pet. It’s like NaNoWriMo got a bunny, then thought it looked lonely and got it a friend. Now NaNoWriMo kind of regrets having to look after thirty-one bunnies. The bunnies have to be fed and exercised every day. They have to be cleaned and given fresh water, and they have to be entertained. Each one of the thirty-one bunnies demands a story, but NaNoWriMo is too busy being a month to do this so it outsources the job to writers on the internet. Sometimes the bunnies demand a very specific story involving word limits, enormous Japanese robots or the subversion of certain literary tropes. The bunnies demand that each story be between fifty-five and one thousand words in length, so that they fit neatly inside their little bunny brains. These are some very demanding bunnies.

I forget where this analogy is going. Flash Fiction Month is not made of bunnies. Neither is it related to NaNoWriMo. It is a month-long event held in July that asks participants to write one piece of flash fiction every day, requiring a surprising level of willpower. On top of this, the organisers set regular challenges for those who wish to attempt them. Despite really only having participated on a whim, I found this to be an extremely rewarding event. If you would like to read more about my experience with Flash Fiction Month, check out The Section with Graphs and Stuff. Otherwise, keep reading for a story about a vampire.