I eventually picked JENNIFER’S PIANO by Ken Elkes because I felt it did everything flash fiction should do. The first line dropped me into the story with perfectly tuned immediacy, and by the end of the second line I knew so much more than the writer had told me. In fact, I’d say that there was as much power and thought in those first two lines than there is the first chapters of many contemporary novels.
… Laughter, suspense, love and tragedy are all there, and when you reach the end, even though you want more, you know that what you’ve had is enough. And this is – I think – what flash fiction should do for the reader. JENNIFER’S PIANO stands as one of the finest examples of the form I have read.
Peter Benton, judge of 2013 Fish Flash Fiction Prize