2026

2nd February
Bruce Aiken (1947-2026).

It is with great sadness that we acknowledge Bruce’s recent passing following a short illness. Bruce was the originator of this 256 Stories project, and had only just got this website up and running when he received his medical diagnosis. With characteristic pragmatism he wasted no time in transferring the whole operation to a pair of willing volunteers, before a handover became impossible.

There is so much to say about Bruce’s life and work, but perhaps this is not the best time or place. We will simply strive to make the project a success, and another part of Bruce’s legacy. Writers everywhere can help us achieve that by continuing to submit their stories. A dedication to Bruce will be included in the foreword to the first anthology.

12th January
Special shout out to Christopher Fielden for his promotional newsletter support

10th January
Posts sent out to some flash fiction Facebook groups. These are some of the people we want to attract.

2nd January
The New Year is in, and site promotion begins in earnest. Beginning with Devon writers, then spreading outwards until we become a global phenomenon…

2025

24th December
A very Merry Christmas to all our contributors, past, present and especially future. It will be a happy New Year – let’s press on and make Volume One a 2026 publication!

25th November
The financial re-homing of the project has now been completed, so we are open for business again! Expect to see some promotional bits and bobs on social media in the near future. Meanwhile if you fancy a break from writing Xmas cards, amuse yourselves by penning a piece of (seasonal?) flash fiction…

16th October
Since the last update, in order to lighten the onerous load on Bruce we have been busy ‘re-homing’ the 256 Stories project – viz. transferring the administrative operations of the project from North Devon to South Devon, and tweaking the website. This has necessitated pausing promotional publicity for a while, and consequently there has only been a small trickle of additional stories into our Inbox. However in the coming weeks we intend to ramp up publicity and attract a steadier stream of submissions.

Meanwhile we are very much open for business, so do please send in your stories and author notes, and spread the word to your fellow writers.

9 August
Stories are not appearing as quickly as I hoped, but then I’m an overly eager type and need to be patient.

23 July
This is what a double page spread will look like