For every story that went over my head, there were two more that had me chuckling, or nodding in recognition. Also, with so many stories in a book, there’s bound to be the odd misfire, and one or two are just too cryptic (I couldn’t figure out one called Triple Penis, Going to Hollywood). This didn’t bother me (I live in the US at the moment, anyway), but there’s the odd turn of phrase and cultural reference that might puzzle some people. Mother-daughter swimslap dancers hardened to steamships,īerg’s writing is very American. The family danced beneath the Mississippiįather and Mother slapped in pretty water rhythm, The last part of Coffee House Lies has a number of very short pieces, sometimes just a few lines this is from Breathing Underwater: Not one of these stories has an ounce of spare fat.
All that is put into practice here, to good effect. Her chapter on writing skills in Writing Flash Fiction reveals how aware she is of what makes a good story: avoid exposition, sloppy dialogue, etc. My favourites: Everyone Wants to Steal My Man, a masterpiece of revelation Paris Blue, in which a maid in the Deep South takes elegant revenge on an awful mistress and Loss of Habitat, a curious story that may make you think about people and animals and how their fates can be oddly similar. Or Saint Jude, about a woman with poor judgement: “They gave an ounce of charity with a pound of moralizing, which made her so mad that one day she came home with the church’s most sacred holy relic in her brassiere.” Other stories are rather thoughtful for example, in Laid to Rest, a woman carefully tends the graves she has made of people who are still alive – the graves are for her relationships with them. They can be bizarrely funny, as in Rock, Paper, Scissors – betrayal comes to light in a hair salon, and is punished, with scissors.
These stories all, in some way, reflect the human condition. Having now read Coffee House Lies, I can report that she is, very.
After reading it, I wanted to see whether she was any good herself. She’s written a guidebook called Writing Flash Fiction that contains some excellent advice on writing in general. Carly Berg must be one its best exponents. Coffee House Lies 100 Cups of Flash Fiction Carly Berg 9781500439743 Books Download As PDF : Coffee House Lies 100 Cups of Flash Fiction Carly Berg 9781500439743 Books Coffee House Lies 100 Cups of Flash Fiction Carly Berg 9781500439743 Booksįlash fiction – short, concise stories as little as one page, and rarely more than four or five – is a form that has become newly popular with digital publishing.
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