Dancing on Fly Ash: One Hundred Word Stories

by Matt Bell, Josh Maday

Dancing On Fly One Hundred Word Stories contains over sixty stories, each one shorter than one hundred words, ranging in tone from humor to drama, from gritty reality to absurd surrealism. Inside, a celebrity plane crash is picked over by grave-robbing memorabilia hunters. Image consultants dispense career advice to both Keanu Reeves and the President of the United States. Lawyers are purchased in pet stores and retirees crowded into prisons. A lottery ticket holds one woman?s only chance for salvation, while elsewhere a long-lost husband pretends to need directions to a home he never should have left. One child becomes a cyborg to facilitate a divorce as another tortures sunflowers for their secrets. "In Dancing On Fly Ash's inspired tales, the best of these short-short-short stories packs the emotional wallop of a novel . . . and when Bell and Maday are at their best, which is frequently, these bullets of fiction sear." --Tod Goldberg, author of Living Dead Girl and Simplify

Genres: Short Stories

80 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 6, 2006

Reviews

[Adrian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Awesome collection of flash fiction. Bell and Maday do so much with a handful of words. An impressive book...

[Erik · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bell and Maday are budding masters of the short-short, with equal parts whimsy and gravitas this is a collection anyone interested in the form shouldn't miss.

[Ada Bonnefoi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Matt Bell and Josh Maday have created with "Dancing on Fly Ash: One Hundred Word Stories" something ... bizarre. No idea if I should call it prose poetry, or simply short stories?! 60 stories, or some more, I have not counted them, in less than 100 words. Now that´s something.
Some are funny, some are dark, some are great, some less so. Often the stories are simply too damn short. Yeah I know, thats why the suckers are called short stories, I hear you.

Sure, they still make sense and everything but I am damned if I did not want to have more of them. More flesh, more bones, something to chew on and bite my teeth into. They are cool, really, and Bell and Maday have alot of emotions packed into those stories. Sometimes anyway. And to write them little pieces is no small task.

But it is so frustrating when the party is already over before the fun even really started. Guys, you owe me a beer, seriously! And those bastards leave alot to their readers imagination (looks like they did have ALOT of trust in us readers that we dont fuck up their stories completely). Thanks btw I appreciate that. I seriously hate it when some writer spills everything out in the open and tells me what a character sees, feels, thinks etc. Drives me up the walls and nuts, so .. maybe I should buy you a beer? How about it? Do we have a deal?

No idea who wrote which story or if they wrote them all together, but it does not really matter I guess. Worth alone for the shit and giggles, and even more so because most of them are really really good.

[Daniel Snyder · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection of stories is brilliant. It’s a book one can read over and over, and each reading reveals something new. Matt and Josh have a created a book that’s like a multi-course gourmet meal: each story is so delicious that the reader practically inhales it; each one seems so simple, but its complexity is revealed in the lingering aftertaste; and the end of each one leaves the reader both sad it’s over and eagerly anticipating the next course. Presenting a range of characters from the high--the President of the United States in “Drunk Dialing from the Oval Office”--to the low--a crystal meth addict desperately carrying around pages stolen from Gideon’s Bible in “Exodus,” this collection of micro-fictions reveals our common humanity, both beautiful and ugly, with insight and humor.

[Tara · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really like what these two authors accomplished. It is very hard to write a story in 100 words. I found I preferred the humorous stories (such as Drunk Dialing in the White House) and the stories that captured a thread of emotion, such as Lucky Penny at the Bus Stop. Would love to see another collection with more along the lines of Lucky Penny.

[Peter · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyable collection of microfiction. But the problem with micro or even flash fiction is that it's hard to fully engage with a story - no sooner are you intrigued by a character or situation, than it's all over. These stories are no exception. Good stuff, but left me wanting more.

[Kathy]

Erik Smetana recommended this to me and I've been meaning to read it, so thanks, Erik!

[Matthew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sixty one hundred word micro stories. Not as good as I had hoped but no real complaints. Some cheap shots mixed in with micro gems. A small, mixed bag.

[Jan Moens · Rating 4 out of 5]

7,5/10