We’re delighted to welcome award winning writer, editor and writing tutor, Marie Gethins as judge for our 30th Award opening shortly and closing on Sunday June 8th, 2025.

Marie Geth­ins featured in Winter Papers, Bristol Short Story Award, Australian Book Review, NFFD Anthologies, Banshee, Fictive Dream, Pure Slush, Bath Flash Fiction Anthologies, and others. Selected for Best Microfictions, BIFFY50, Best Small Fictions, she edits for flash ezine Splonk, critiques for Oxford Flash Fiction Prize. She has won or been placed in many Awards including Reflex Fiction, TSS, The Bristol Short Story Prize, Bath Short Story Award. Flash Fiction Festival Online. She lives in Cork, Ireland.

• You are an editor and interview manager for the Irish flash fiction journal Splonk (currently on haitus) and have interviewed many award-winning writers, including veterans of the short short form, Lydia Davis and Stuart Dybek, Can you tell us briefly about their remarks about flash fiction that stuck with you?

I am an avid fan of both Lydia Davis and Stuart Dybek! They create whole worlds with incredible compression. They were fascinating to interview on short short stories.

Davis employs a similar technique in her interview responses with very short but precise insights. I admire her advice to treat subjects with ‘respect’ and that a flash should be ‘fresh and unpredictable right up to the end–unpredictable, but not gratuitous’. I see a lot of submissions with twist endings that are not earned, which can be an easy trope to fall into.

Dybek is far more detailed in his interview, providing so much helpful guidance coloured with personal experience. I enjoy his comparing flash to jazz and saying that it can ‘serve as a way of expanding, redefining, or breaking genre’ One of the aspects I love is the playfulness and flexibility of the form.

Confluence and craft are key differentiators for me. Weaving two threads seamlessly into a flash provides depth, insight and often surprise. Metaphor, subtext, using language and/or situations in fresh ways can provide excitement. Every word should earn its place. Careful craft provides more to mine, so that even after multiple reads there are new revelations. Creative formatting that supports the text and thematic elements can work really well too. I’m pretty eclectic in my tastes, open to many styles and subjects. A straightforward, linear narrative without subtext that you read once and get the whole is unlikely to catch my interest. Some writers still seem to feel flash is only about word count.

• You have been placed in, or won many short fiction awards, including 2nd place in The Bristol Prize 2023 (with a flash length piece) and third place in The Bath Short Story Award, 2024 and you have been published in numerous anthologies and journals. One of your most recent publications ‘Before the Implosion’ is in Fictive Dream’s flash fiction February 2025 It’s a marvellous flash that slowly reveals a back story about the characters that has had a huge impact on their current lives, Can you tell us how you went about writing this and its inspiration?

‘Before the Implosion’ is fiction, but neighbours from my California childhood inspired some aspects. I was in my late teens before I learned that a kindly neighbour (third generation American) and his family were interned during WW2. My school US history books did not mention that the camps had existed. While as writers we cannot say ‘history repeats itself’ because that is a cliché (!), current affairs certainly disturb me. I hope that in some small way the flash says, yes this can happen and empathy is really admirable.

• Your stories are notable for their arresting titles — for eg your Scottish Arts Trust shortlisted piece To the new neighbour three doors down who steals my strawberries’, which we can hear you reading here ‘ Do you spend a lot of time working on titles for your stories?

Titles are darn hard to get right but are especially important in flash where you have to say so much with so little. The ideal title is one that suggests something initially but provides a much deeper meaning after reading the flash. It is often the last thing I settle on and can take the greatest amount of time. Trust your reader. I find flash fiction lovers are a curious lot and are willing to do a bit of work if you provide the opportunity. If you name only one character or place in a piece, that can send the reader to do a bit of research on meanings. Changing a title word order can transform it. Do play around with your title, make it sing.

Oh, thanks so much for asking. I absolutely love my protagonist and miss him since I finished the novel some time ago. It also was longlisted in the 2024 Bridport Novel Prize.

The Perpetual Lives of Horace Greenly follows a physically disabled immortal through three time periods: Victorian London, late 1980s San Francisco Bay Area, and a futuristic Stockholm. Born in Ancient Rome, Horace tries to resolve the mystery of why he is doomed to repeat adulthood, seemingly for eternity. When he discovers another immortal, he is excited until he learns her sinister plans for their shared world domination. In a futuristic Stockholm he faces two penultimate options: achieve death’s release through medical innovation or remain to thwart a future he cannot allow.

It’s really rewarding to help people with editorial suggestions and then hear back that they have placed the piece. Sometimes it just needs a second pair of eyes to spot a few things, other times a different POV or moving paragraphs around and trimming. I love teaching—online, as with the Irish Writers Centre, or in person at literary festivals. Online there is usually a great international element and those different cultural perspectives are wonderful, often broadening our understanding of a flash. I teach three to four courses per year, each with different approaches, through the Irish Writers’ Centre online. I mention upcoming courses vis Bluesky (@mariegethins.bsky.social) or Instagram (marie_gethins).

In a busy open- plan restaurant a small party is seated near the very visible kitchen.
Protagonist could be any member of staff or one of the seated party.
Use the imperative as a mental address from protagonist to another person OR as a ‘conscience’ interiority (e.g. the devil or angel on a shoulder) as the meal progresses.