Openings

by Charlotte Hinger

So what is the crazy group of people doing? I don't have the slightest idea. But nevertheless, that's the writer's job. To make a coherent pattern of disconnected elements. 

Screen writers have it made. In a single opening scene they can portray the weather, the family's income, relationships, time of day, the professions of the characters, pets the family has acquired. Easy peasy.

Those of us who have to wrestle with words to convey all of the above have a hard time getting the same amount of information across. Openings are critical to engaging the reader. Book buyers don't put up with much. They decide in a few pages whether or not to complete a purchase.

The classic opening gives the reader a glimpse of the ordinary world on the day everything changes. This applies to all genres; mystery, romance, westerns, literary novels, fantasy, children's books, and science fiction.

Think about it. Almost all successful books start this way. An owl shows up and gives an invitation to a small English boy who has been dumped on a family who resents his presence. An unhappy beauty watches her evil step-sisters' rejoice over an invitation to a ball. A mysterious narrator tells us to "Call me Ishmael." 

One of my favorite openings is from First Blood, the brilliant novel written by David Morrell. It's actually a literary book about the social fabric disrupted by the war in Vietnam. No, I'm not kidding. The movie--however exciting--is a rather flagrant departure from the manuscript. 

Never mind. Just consider all that Morrell accomplishes in a few sentences:

    His name was Rambo, and he was just some nothing kid for all anybody knew, standing by the pump of a gas station at the outskirts of Madison, Kentucky. He had a heavy long beard, and his hair was hanging down over his ears to his neck, and he had his hand out trying to thumb a ride from a car stopped at the pump. 

 The above is one sentence from the opening paragraph. It's all there: setting, characterization, conflict in one fell swoop. 

Portraying the "ordinary world" quickly and with vivid prose is hard. Unique details can set a book apart. Bits of action that incorporate the five senses can add depth to characters. These "beats" can enliven dialogue with a few well chosen words. 

The car that stops for Rambo is a police car. The man inside says "Well then, hop in." But Rambo did not move. He continued to sip his Coke. 

See how it's done? Just a few sentences and the scene is set. 

My advice to writers, both beginners and seasoned veterans, is go to the library and study opening scenes. Read! Think about the construction behind openingsthat engage you. 

Tell, Don't Show

by Charlotte Hinger

One of the most misunderstood "rules" in writing successful novels is the instruction to "Show, don't tell." Sometimes a story moves more quickly when the writer uses the limited omniscience viewpoint. An engaging narrative voice using descriptive details can jump start mysteries. 

One of my favorite book about the craft of writing is The Successful Novelist by David Morrell. It includes an excellent chapter on viewpoint. He describes his struggles with the beginning of his novel, First Blood. The book is a literary novel, by the way. He warns readers it's nothing like the movie. And it isn't.

He tried limited third person through Rambo's eyes. It didn't work. He tried alternating third person between Rambo and Teasle, the relentless policeman. He still wasn't happy with the beginning. Then he came up with this:

His name was Rambo, and he was just some nothing kid for all anybody knew, standing by the pump of a gas station on the outskirts of  Madison, Kentucky. He had a long heavy beard, and his hair was hanging down over his ears to his neck, and he had his hand out trying to thumb a ride from a car that was stopped at the pump. 

Other best-selling authors begin books with limited omniscience.  

Consider this beginning from Tana French's best seller, In the Woods:  

Picture a summer stolen whole from some coming-of-age film set in a small-town 1950s. This is none of Ireland's subtle seasons mixed for a connoisseur's palate. . . ." 

Of the beginning of Elizabeth George's novel, A Place of Hiding:

Santa Ana winds were no friends of photography, but that was something you could not tell an egomanical architect who believed his entire reputation rested upon capturing for posterity--and for Architectural Digest--fifty-two thousand square feet of unfinished hillside sprawl today. 

In my historical novel, Come Spring, one of my early paragraphs began:

She was a frail watercolor of a woman, very slight, with yellow hair and pale, sensitive blue eyes that could become pridefully unreadable in an instant. In another setting she would have been lovely but the prairie sun was too strong for her. It bleached her out--her hair, her skin, her very soul--with its harshness.  

Morrell recommends experimenting with different points of view. 

One rule that I consider set in stone is this: If something works, it works.