Yes, yes – I’m doing it again. Because I liked the jolt it gave me last year, and because otherwise, considering the writing course I’m teaching, and the looming Summer Season, and a couple of largish jobs I’ve taken, I might be tempted to push my writing aside for now…

…And that would be very bad on all sorts of level. So, instead, I’m taking the plunge again, and doing StoryADay May. Well, not quite, if we are to be nitpicky. It’s going to be more on the lines of FiveFlashFictionsAWeek, or TwentyFlashFictionsMay… But then, Julie Duffy herself encourages participants to set their own rules – and so these are my rules:

• Flash fiction – because that’s what I want to work on right now.
• At least five stories a week. After all, last years I challenged myself to write at least three stories each week, and it worked, and now I am rising the stakes.
• First drafts only. No revision – not at this stage. There are Junes for that. In between frantic rehearsals, and school plays, and the beginning of the Season – but still.
• And I’d like to say “No research”, too – but… yes, well. Let us keep it at “No rabbit holes,” shall we?

So, in two days we begin. I’m going in far less jittery than I did last year. It’s not the first time anymore, I have a reasonable idea of what to expect of myself. I’ve prepared a little, and I have no other major writing project claiming my attention right now. Not yet, at least – because we all know the way things have of cropping up, don’t we? But still, last year I did have another major project to mind through the whole month – and still managed to complete the challenge… Let us hope it doesn’t mean I’m going in too relaxed. The jitters are, after all, part of the idea.

Ah well, I’ll let you know.

And, by the way, I love the Tube-themed “Mind the Gap” background in the challenge banner… All the more because, when writing interconnected flash fiction, gaps are to be minded very much indeed. Perfect, isn’t it? I can’t wait.

And what about you, o Readers? Care to join a little challenge?