This week, I want you to write an epistolary story. I don’t just mean “write a story in the form of a letter,” though that’s one way you could tackle the prompt. I want a story where a narrator is relating a story to someone else.

Maybe your story is in the form of an email from a person to their boss, explaining the wacky new adventure they’re on that’ll prevent them from returning to work. Maybe it’s a eulogy: someone telling a story addressed to a person they’ve lost, trying to say things they didn’t say when they were alive. (One of my favorite short stories I’ve read recently is Nino Cipri’s ”The Shape of My Name”, which takes this approach.)

Thunderdome struggles with frame stories, and I understand why: it’s hard to develop both the frame and the central story when there’s such a tight word limit. I’d recommend thinking of your central story first, then thinking about why, and to whom, a character might be telling that story. Why does the narrator believe it’s important to tell this story to this person? A winning or HMing story will probably leave me thinking about how the addressee might respond or react.

I’m happy to hand out flash rules.