"Don't introduce too many characters at once." Gandalf, Dwalin, Balin, Kili, Fili, Dori, Nori, Ori, Oin, Gloin, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Thorin, and Bilbo walked into a bar.
😂😂 I loved this. Tolkien would like a word with this TH-camr, although he's an EXCEPTIONAL writer who can get away with introducing so many characters at once lmao.
another reason why this video is bullshit and just applies to people who wanna read the most generic thriller type stories. heck, I'm not even a LOTR fan (love The Hobbit) but Tolkein IS an icon of the literary world, and half of this 'advice' goes against how he wrote.
@revenge12212012 No. The dwarves are taken at first as a bunch. They come in pairs, but they don't have a definition of character. Except for Thorin they are not developed and represent little of the action. Only acting as a crowd. The way they appear at Bag's End is a form of making you wonder what the heck is happening. But except for Thorin they are blurred until later and even then not much. Balin. And then Fili and Kili for reasons.
The 11 terrible ways to start a novel are: 1. Starting 10 pages before the beginning 2. Introducing too many characters 3. Not creating conflict 4. Not introducing your main character 5. Starting with summary 6. Burying the reader in info 7. Making the reader feel dumb 8. Changing point of view 9. Starting with a dream sequence 10. Waking up to an alarm clock 11. Believing confusion is the same thing as subtlety
So a dream sequence involving 20 characters, none of which is the protagonist, which is the same dream they've been having every day of their life and it gets interrupted by an alarm at the end?
The alarm clock opening I think is writers not realizing they’re writing a novel instead of a TV show, where in 30 seconds of screen time you can get some decent visual world building in and go from there, as a viewer can clearly see where the story’s world differs from the real world. Writing it out, it ends up being Chapter 1: Hero’s Personal Hygine where we learn more about the protagonist’s colon function than the plot
I think the only book that makes a character's morning routine interesting is Quo Vadis but it's a Roman playboy waking up at noon after an orgy in Nero's palace
Me looking back on my old story that I wrote in the sixth grade that started with the protagonist waking up to an alarm clock and another one that started with a dream sequence. I feel pain🥲
In a way it is kinda sad that attention spans have gotten so bad the simple unfolding of a story gradually is seen as the writer wasting the reader's time
True. Reel and tiktok brainrot is ruining human art and creativity. By the way things are going, cities and houses will be boring as shit, dull, gray, and full of A.I. ruling our lives. People will hate reading. People will turn into selfish zombies thirsty for quick entertainment. Then A.I. will get so advanced and they will rise against humanity. The robot swarm will overthrow humanity, and put us in cages, and the robots will make more robots made with titanium skeletons and silicone flesh, and humans will no longer be the greatest species on earth. And once The Swarm wins in the Great War against the weak humans with fleshy meat and pathetic skeletons of calcium, they will rule for ages. After much research and experimentation, the robots will reinvent themselves and design themselves with actual meat and blood and self-generating properties, and the Human race will arise once more. And when humanity rises from the ashes like a great phoenix, another Great War will happen, and this time the humans will win, and the robots will be defeated. The human leaders will erase all existence of the A.I. past, and they will create fake gods and sciences, and brainwash the newer generations of humans, slowly but surely. And History will repeat itself, over and over.
Depends on how it's done. You have to make it interesting to read to pull this approach. Which means the prose itself needs to be a good hook, which has a razor-thin margin of error. If you fail at this, then yeah, you're kinda wasting your reader's time. I say this as someone taking this approach. I don't have a super dramatic first line, I don't introduce the first seeds of conflict until like, the fourth or fifth paragraph. I don't introduce a second character until page 5, and we don't get a third character until halfway through chapter two. As a result, the characters, the world, and the prose itself has to be the thing that interests the reader to propel them into the story. Which means I have to be incredibly careful with what specific words I use on the page, lest I break the immersion of the prose entirely. It requires a LOT of confidence to pull something off like this, and the skills to back up this confidence. There's a good chance that I fail to pull it off and it just comes off as pretentious and purple instead.
I generally don't like this "list of things you should always/never do" type of writing advice videos, because they tend to discourage thinking about what you're doing and why you do it in favor of simply following arbitrary rules. That said, this is actually pretty solid advice. So, good job. You managed to convince me to not close the video at the halfway point and delete it from my view history.
Exactly. Really grinds my gears that people words advice this way. Best way to approach stories is to always have a reason for why you are writing something. It's okay to break convention, but you should have a reason for it. It should be done with purpose. Sure, might not always work out, but that's the beauty of experimentation. You can always end up with something exceptionally good as well.
@@woytahr8463 To quote the late Sir Terry Pratchett: "That's why there's rules, understand? So that you think before you break 'em." Basically, it's all just advice, and you have to decide for yourself if that advice makes sense to you. Most "rules" of writing are only meant to hold you back _just enough_ early on to stop you from forming really bad habits that might be hard to get rid of later. You're going to need to start questioning them eventually. Not because they're all wrong, or to be a contrarian rebel, but because the whole point of creating art is expressing what is true to _you._ Even when a writer swears by certain rules, those are just axioms that happen to apply to them personally. Take Brandon Sanderson's Laws of Magic: Those make perfect sense _if you're Brandon Goddamned Sanderson,_ a man who is _obviously_ completely obsessed with extremely specific hard magic systems. That's what works _for him_ - it's his context of what writing fantasy stories is. So of course that's the advice he'll give. If that applies to you as a writer, awesome! But it doesn't necessarily have to.
I disagree, I basically view these kinds of videos as fun examples of how things can go terribly wrong with your book and then the fun challenge is to come up with ways to still do at least one of these things and get away with it. xD
@@CitizenMio Right, see, that's you actually thinking about it. You question how the advice may or may not be valid and you are willing to experiment. That's good. I'm just concerned that a lot of people don't think about it and start viewing creative writing as a set of arbitrary instructions to follow. Especially if they're inexperienced writers who lack confidence in their skills and are scared of ever making a mistake. I.e exactly the sort of person this type of video is intended for.
@@RelativelyBest True but that's why we can do our good work in the comment section. xD If we are to assume our readers aren't dumb, writers best not be either. Anyone starting out will hopefully soon learn to look at multiple sources and adjust according to what works for them. Which is true for anything in life. Either way, someone will eventually inform them if their writing isn't that great yet. If they love writing they'll make an effort to get better at it and develop their own style and confidence. Meaning that trying to apply the concepts in these videos is just more practice. But for anyone who feels crushed and demotivated by any perceived "rules" that seem to denounce their efforts: Don't be, just keep on writing. If you need to write, write! It's the only way to get better and really learn what works and what doesn't in YOUR story.
I also hate dream sequences, because they NEVER look like any real dream anyone has. They are always super obviously symbolic, the character always wales up with a start before any real revelation, and they never go to their friends and tell them “I had the weirdest dream “!
I mean, they're _not_ dreams. They're pretty much always prophetic, or they're otherwise literally the protagonist being informed about the plot by an outside party. That's also why they're very ineffective. The protagonist is just being talked at in a not-real scenario that has nothing to do with what they're about to actually do with their day.
In all fairness, the only way to create a realistic "dream" is through AI. Or copious amounts of LSD. But, in general, I agree. But I think he's specifically talking about starting with the clichéd anxiety dream that never actually has any bearing on the plot. There are better ways to convey anxiety.
My son just told me of a recent dream. He's learning to drive. So in his dream, one of his friends is drunk so my son has to die. But the wheel is so big that he's constantly hitting his knees, and his feet get stuck to the pedals so he has to wiggle them to get them unstuck, while the car accelerates. "And then" he tells me "Joe Biden gets in the car. And I'm thinking, what if we get attacked while I'm driving?" You can't make this stuff up, I guess 😆
the story i'm making begins with a dream sequence and the main character waking up- but that's because dreams in my story are actually re-caps of events from an alternate universe, making them "real" in that world so i guess the best way to incorporate dream sequences is to actually have them be relevant to the plot
As long as the reader understands that's what's happening fairly quickly into the plot. Because what you say is interesting. If it's random dreaming, you might lose the reader.
@@Bookfox Yes, I believe it depends on the level of experience and the context of introducing more than 4 characters in the first chapter. Most beginning writers would simply introduce many characters (who pop up like ballons) just for the sake of having many characters.
Turgeniev started his books with side characters. Always. Tension was created by atmosphere 'It was a sunny day in the outskirts of the very pretty village X...' and a hunch of a conflict - 'He wanted tot talk to her, but didn't dare to'. The main story and the main characters start somewhere in chapter 2. You will not feel cheated, you will feel friendly carried away in the world of the story, before something important happens: the arrival of a stranger. It's classical, old fashioned 19th century storytelling, but by no means boring.
I think if you're writing in the 19th century, this could work. In general, expectations tend to be different now. Not that I don't like reading those books! (I do). But they could get away with more leisurely pacing than it's possible to do nowadays.
I agree. The advice to 'start as late as possible' more often than not leads to a novel that feels rushed and unbalanced. Give the first act it's time in the sun. For a lot of readers, that's their favorite part!
@@tridek1949 Yeah, I love that. It can be dull and terribly boring, sure, but if you're worth anything as a writer you can make any mundane scene interesting by your use of words, showing charming, relatable characters and relationships between them, writing interesting dialogue, creating a captivating atmosphere, including humour. Maybe I'm an exception (I love the 19th century literature and I hate modern literature) but I actually find pleasure in, you know, reading, not just getting to know the story.
@bookfox - but aren't "expectations" and "what you could get away with now" just a fashion of now - who knows where we'll be in 50 years, even 20 years ? I think this is where the publishing houses can be problematic if they are so prescriptive. Just because something is the norm, doesn't mean it should be a rule.
The modern view of writing is to dump your character into the story, then go from there. There are advantages to that, but tension and conflict are not the same thing. Conflict is about obstructed goals. Your MC wants something, the antagonist wants something mutually exclusive. Voilá, conflict. Tension is the sense that something is going to happen and it may not be good. Hitchcock's bomb under the table shows tension, but no conflict. What I see a lot is people thinking they need physical conflict at the beginning. This isn't bad, I have a few books that begin with fight scenes, but it could be non physical conflict: the MC wanting breakfast and someone has eaten the last of the cereal, or some kind of rejection of the MC. Beginning with tension is different. There is some kind of limit set, and the character, knowingly or not, needs to accomplish something within that limit. I also have a problem with the 'don't start in the ordinary world' advice I see a lot. Unless the character has no attachment to the world they live in, we need to get at least a hint of their world before the inciting incident etc breaks it. If we jump into the new world right away, we don't get the sense of loss from the character that the familiar is broken. Imagine Harry Potter starting with him walking into Hogwarts. This doesn't mean that there is no conflict or tension in the familiar world. It shouldn't be boring, or there isn't much reason for the MC to want to stay there. So create your throughline here. What question will the character answer by the end of the book? How can you first ask that question in the start. I have a character in my newest draft who makes up challenges for himself, but they are physical challenges, he doesn't pay attention to the personal drama happening around him until he starts losing people and he realizes that's he's a bit of a jerk. Cue quest to become less of a jerk etc. It needs lots of work, but that quest to define himself and pay attention to others instead of his own needs will echo through the story in a variety of ways.
THIS. THIS THIS THIS. most writers i watch on youtube, while i envy their intelligence and love 98% of their advice, always always always insist on starting right in the middle of the story. i think the ordinary world is important! where do you get contrast without it? as long as your ordinary world is meaningful and sets up or foreshadows events or themes from down the road, then i think you should go for it. your points on tension and conflict are also extremely important distinctions.
I also have a very hard time CARING about somebody when the character is dumped midway into a story. I know nothing about them, I'm not invested in them. Why should their conflict bother me?
I think it depends ds on the "ordinary world". If the characters daily life is somehow unimaginable to the reader, then it NEEDS description. If it's a mainstream every day kind of ordinary that the reader has no hardship imagining, the story can start in conflict right away. Stuff like Janne Tellers "Nothing" comes in mind where the outburst and refusal of going back to the mundane by a classmate interrupt the "normal life" of his classmates. No one actually needs a lull length description of the whole lesson. The story can start with a classmates unusual exclamation during it.
So many times I find myself closing the tab before a video is finished, but you don't give me time to do that. I really, really like the way you end your videos. Information packed into 99.99999% of the video, and a
I definitely think the start the conflict immediately advice depends on the genre. I think in the case of horror your audiance is buying into the idea of build up and it benefits showing normalcy first for a contrast later. For sci fi and fantasy where you have these complicated or weird worlds, it benefits to show what normal looks like in this world to ground the reader, thats not advocating description or lore dumping at the start but i think conflict often requires some set up. If you immediately have two armies fighting with no stakes, thats also bad.
Conflict can be very subtle. I don't mean outright fighting right away. Just an indication that another character has a different perspective is conflict.
You can start the conflict immedietly too in sci fi and fantasy. What he meant is sometimes people want to explained too long the wonder of the silk embroided with diamond dressing the rail on the rainbow bridge but not the character fighting on it
I agree except that many mysteries start with a focus on the victim and their POV, before bringing in the sleuth to solve the murder. Such as The DaVinci Code for a famous example.
Yes, true, but Da Vinci Code wasn't his first novel. He was already an established author by that time, and they get a lot more leeway than up and comers. Remember that.
On the Changing point of view. I worked on a book with two point's of view and solved the problem by having the character write in first person in a Diary, but narrate the events and actions in the story through third person. This can work.
I'm fully on board with all those points, except for the bit about ditching dream sequences. As long as dreams play some kind of role in the story, I say go for it! There's actually a really practical reason for this, especially when it comes to self-publishing. See, most self-publishing platforms use algorithms to automatically categorize your book into different genres. They really do not care what you think your genre is. They usually pick three, based on a sample of the text. Now, if you've got a prologue with a dream sequence that dives right into the heart of the story, it gives that algorithm something concrete to work with. It's like a super-condensed version of your book in just a few pages, which helps those algorithms accurately categorize your work. That section should not be written until your entire novel is completed and ready to be published.
A lot of today's writing styles don't work with "yesteryear's" writing styles. I read "The Three Musketeers" and even though it's a _long_ book, it has lots of "telling, not showing" and summarizing as well. And then there's f-n "Moby Dick" which could have had 90% of it eliminated and still tell the same story. I will never read that 💩again or other books that can't get to the action soon enough. 🐳
@@grondhero old books were the products of their time, for the audience of their time. Trying to mimic the style of 19th century writing is shooting yourself in the leg. The audience has changed, their tastes has changed, and the overall quality of books has increased.
The mention of starting a novel with a dream sequence reminds me of one book I read a few months ago, "The Honeys", by Ryan La Sala. When I first started reading I thought, "Okay, it's starting with a dream," but I was wrong. The first scene just seemed too intense to really be happening, and when I realized that it was actually real, that's when I knew that I was going to love that book. And I was right- I loved the entire thing, and it's still one of my favorites, now.
Great video! My MC wakes up to a rooster's crow, but "it was the cry of a phoenix that rang in his ears." I don't show the nightmare, but I use it to show the MC lives in a world where he is powerless.
You are amazing. Simply incredible , how you balance the energy of your presentation with relevant content. Also great flow to all your videos. Thank you. 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼
One of my favourite books that I think did the dream sequence opening well is The Ghost Next Door by R. L. Stein. It starts with the mc having a dream about her bedroom being on fire but later we learn that it actually wasn't a dream at all and that she actually died when her house caught on fire. I like it because the dream sequence actually matters to the story and is important to the mc's revelation at the end of the book
All good advice, though I know some people take it too far. You get a lot of leeway with setting things up, you just need to get a couple of good hooks to pull in the reader's interest.
Good video. I liked the idea that writers have to ‘find their beginning’. Sorting those most relevant details from those which can come later is some advice I can really use
It works for TV shows and movies, but not so much for novels; however, if the character has no idea whose alarm clock it is (is it in his room or is he in a room he's not familiar with?), then that could be good.
I have a bunch of books with the same pov but the focus character changes fairly often. The fact that it's third person doesn't mean it has to be the same person all the time.
I have a bit of an issue with the point you made at 6:21 This point only works IF the mundane isn’t being used to “enhance” the readers focus on a characters life or overall issue connected to it. Now don’t get me wrong, this IS in fact a genius way to hook in readers (in fact some could argue that it’s one of the most consistent ways a lot of novelists/writers in general get a reader hooked, if you’ve ever seen “The Stand” mini-series OR read the book King does this for literally every character in that story) even so, if introducing a character through their mundane part of life that might just help the reader see what the problem is, the numbness they feel in relation to existence. The horror a person has to acknowledge realizing an ultimately fruitless and pointless existence in life is NOT something that necessarily hurts a story. In fact, it may be what it is all about in the first place. But yeah, you make a valid point nonetheless, just with some caveats. (Technically as with most things relating to the arts I could apply this level of reasoning to your other points, but I think you basically differentiated the good and the bad between all of them, just felt that this one is a little too broad compared to how you tackled the rest) great video so far though! Keep it up! Edit: (Just to clarify something) I did watch the entire video and I know you said that people can break the rules every once in a while. I just made this comment because you explained the other points with such a well-done specificity that I think that one could have had as well. Bravo as I said before!
Nothing wrong with starting the book off in a dream sequence as long as it's done correctly. A great example is if you have a character who can see the future in their dreams, and if you open the story with the line, "John dreams of (blah blah blah)" you're setting up the world you're building, in addition to foreshadowing things that may or may not come.
Yes, I believe I said that it's an exception if the dream is a prophecy, because prophecies are more like foreshadowing or flash forwards rather than a true dream.
About summaries: A summary about the characters is fine, imo. It's a very different way to begin than summarising the world or the plot. If you give some info about who the characters are and what they've been doing and how they view each other etc. it's a good start to the book and can lead the reader into investigating a question about the characters that they want answers to. It can be better than interrupting the action with explanations. We know who they are? Good! Now let's get on with it!
Your advice on 3 things to do when introducing a character changed a lot on my first draft and helped me avoid almost all of these terrible ways to start my novel. So thank you very much. I will now go back and start my fourth revision on my prologue/chapter 1 soon. Wish me luck.
While these are good pieces of advice, I think they’re not really for everyone. There is more than one way to hook a reader than to drop them right into the inciting incident. In fact dropping me right into the middle of something with little explanation turns me off as much spending too much time putting the inciting incident off can. How long the prelude needs to last really depends on the story being told and the ability of the writer to create a world that a reader wants to know better.
That's why he often says "in general" because *_generally speaking_* these are things you want to avoid. Tolkien "violated" several standardized rules of writing and he did quite well. He's obviously an exception. You won't be starting a mystery the same way you start an action thriller or erotica. They're all different, but _generally speaking_ this is all good advice to help us.
My fantasy story started with a brief prologue introducing the world through a couple secondary characters, and the Cosmic Horror Event that kicks off the story. First chapter we meet the actual heroes.
I always underestimate my writing. It's just never enough, and that enabled me to see the cracks right below the surface. Because there's just something about writing that's more than just sewing words and paragraphs together. You know there's always has to be deep levels of philosophy that people kinda stick around with. There's moral lessons to be dissected, there's dialogues that need analyzing, that sort of thing. I just don't have enough concentration to really grasp the concept that I intend to explore in my works. It's more than just explaining it in a way. Don't know how else to describe it.
I think you can do a swap. 95% of My book is from first person on the mc. But when it does swap another character (an entire chapter on them) I use third person limited
6:26 I actually think it’s good to start with the mundane, but keep that VERY VERY brief, get to that “inciting incident” quickly if you do that. But I think it’s a good way to show the contrast, the MC’s life was pretty ordinary then BAM they’re thrown into an adventure.
I've been writing for a long time and one thing I have always had a hard time dealing with in how to enter a scene in a new chapter when it is action oriented or fast and set in a new location. You have to balance all of it and keep pace. So what you are saying here is actually good advice for the start and each separate start afterwards.
The most common reason by far that makes me stop reading a book before ten pages in is ... that the book is not the kind of story I like to read. No brilliant start is going to fix that. Problem on the first page: I don't really like that, it makes me feel rushed. I like to know a bit more before the action starts. What I don't like is spending this more on stuff that will never be relevant again once the action starts - then I feel I wasted that time. That would often be the case, for example, when the start of the action is an attack that destroys the village, kills everyone except the protagonist, and we spent that time learning all the people killed and what everyone was like and what their jobs were and so on - information that has now become completely useless. But then, I don't like those action starters anyway, so ... People are different.
This video was so helpful- I subscribed ✅ Thank you for giving it to us straight, no chaser. Love "getting right to the point" advice. And yay for the, "little dance" 👯♀️💃🏻🙌
I have 4 different stories I’ve thought of making, 1 that I’m super dedicated to and I’ve been thinking about since 2020 but I haven’t gotten to actually writing it. I plan on making it a graphic novel so I’m making practice graphic novel rn to get my skills up before I make that one. Because I want that one to be big but I don’t want it to totally suck lmao. But these are very good tips, I feel more motivated
I'm sorry, but not all novels that start with a little history or culture creation (ex. LOTR/HOBBIT) begins with literal SLOW beginning, and it's a world class story. So, the first point is from personal perspective -- as in, each has their favorite style of novels .
One of the books with various POVs in it that I love is Wonder by R. J. Palacio. They’re broken up into segments so it flows nicely, and it allows us to understand the character when we see them one way through someone’s eyes, and then see them through their own eyes.
Another great example is Night Angel Nemesis by Brent Weeks (warning for anyone who might wanna check it out, that's the 4th book in the Night Angel series, so I wouldn't just jump straight into Nemesis).
Hello Your videos are fascinating. Thank you so much ! Could you address the subject of storytelling tenses? Present tense, past tense, their advantages and disadvantages? Thank you so much ! Lionel, from Paris - France
Jennifer Egan writes from multiple viewpoints. It can sometimes even take a while to know whose viewpoint it is (until we realise they briefly appeared as a 'side note' in someone else's life, 100+ pages ago...or even as a 'side note' in a previous novel). Absolutely amazing and Pulitzer Prize winning author! She's proof that if you can do it right, you can do anything!
No 4 is mentioned in every writing video/course/blog that exists today. Introduce your main character straight away. Don't let your reader become invested in a character who is not the MC. Matthew Reilly starts Ice Station with the characters from Wilkes who end up getting killed in the opening chapter. The MC (Shane "Scarecrow" Scofield) isn't introduced until chapter 2. Dan Brown starts The DaVinci Code with the curator being murdered in the Louvre Museum. Again, MC (Robert Langdon) is not introduced until second chapter. For every person who rotes this piece of advice, there are multiple published, successful authors who have broken with this. Tell the story that needs to be told, in the way it needs to be told. If that means introducing the main character in chapter 2, then so be it.
Multiple experienced and successful authors. Aka, people who don't need to watch a video about how to write a book. Experienced authors who know what they're doing can ignore these guidelines. People who are just starting out can certainly ignore them, but since they probably don't know what they're doing, they'll just add to the massive slush pile that fails at all these things.
Hi,i love your videos and I've been following your channel.My request for future or next video tutorial: How to write espionage or secret agent spy novel. Spy novels or espionage spy novel has been overlooked, overrated and no one is talking about this type of work. I worked on my spy novel since early 2015 until now,it still in development stages. Please? Thanks.
1:37 Emily Rodda did do that in her book Rowan of Rin, but she did it well. Sure she introduced like, 8 characters in the first chapter but they're only in it for the first or second chapter.
I personally like, as a beginner, to sometimes think with a summary as a type of just in case for me not to forget important things. Plus, one of my favorite novels, Heaven Official's Blessing, starts with a summary of the life of the protagonist. And in the end of the first chapter we already know how much he f-ed up in life. So i love that personally.
I hate this modern trend that Im supposed to "hook readers attention" like I have to submit myself to their will. Its manipulative. I like what Gass did in The Tunnel, where he made the first few chapters way harder than the rest of the book to weed off the weak
Yes, this advice is more for authors who are writing more conventional books. Gass is pretty experimental -- I would give completely different advice for someone wanting to write like him.
@@Bookfox That's the problem though. "Conventional" novels are continuing this broken trend that destroys literature by way of high profit so advice like this gets parroted around like a scripture because to most people money=truth.
@@greatcoldemptiness; It's definitely important to consider the artistic merits of one's work. However, if we're talking about practical reality, I think to most people money equals food and rent. Being experimental and taking daring risks is much easier if one can literally afford to do so. It gets quite a bit less tempting when you've got bills to pay.
@@greatcoldemptinessHow about writing for fun, not money? That's what I do. And I want to hook the reader as much as anyone, because in the end of the day it's entertainment and that's what I want to do. Entertain.
I feel the same. To say, these are good tips overall, but I think very... modern and western. Anime and manga often start before the story starts to show characters' daily life. Older novel like Lord of the Rings do this too and people loved it. I also think people, or more likely western modern novel readers, lost patience if they aren't hooked at the first page. If people don't have the patience to read some daily life, I think my novel will be the wrong for them anyway, it's rather slow-paced and a lot about daily life, magic in daily life, people's internal struggles etc.
Starting with an alarm clock can work great, it just has to turn out to be in a different place or time than they expected. Or the immediate mystery when the character suddenly realises they don't own an alarm clock.
Agree with a lot of the points here. Especially the "too many characters" one. If I'm juggling a ton of characters at the opening chapter and I can't tell who's who, I'll put the book down. Same with opening with action scenes where it's just pure chaos and I can't tell what the setting is, who the people are, and there's a lot of weird terms thrown at me.
Stranger in a Strang Land is one of my all-time favorite books, but...the info drop at the beginning seems like it's 12 chapters long. Heinlein goes into great detail about traveling to and from Mars, how it's done, who is doing it and why it takes 21 years for a return trip to even be possible. Everyone I have suggested this book too I have had to tell them, "Yeah, the first part is really hard to read and really boring and you probably won't under most of it on your first read but...once you get past that, the book really grabs you."
omg, the dream sequence one is the worst! I once startet to read a fantasy novel and on the first page there was this really well done gruesome, brutal scene and I was happily surprised the author really did that, just to read the "and then she woke up" a few lines later... I was so pissed, I threw the book out of my shelf xD
A dream sequence doesn't _have_ to be a fake-out, though. If it is clear at the outset that we are reading about the MC's dream, a well-executed dream sequence might be an interesting way to introduce the character's view of the world. Similarly, a fantasy sequence that we quickly learn is a scene in a role-paying game (after a paragraph or three, we see an italicized narration, "After you open the trapdoor, Alfric sniffs the faintest odor of almond oil. Roll a perception check") could be a perfectly valid introduction to one or more characters, in a way. Of course, this depends on the reader recognizing a role-playing game.
"Not introducing the main character" 60 pages of slice of life about some bishop in Fuckville-de-Nowhere and his only purpose is to give the actual main character (who doesn't show up until we got through this slog) a push in the right direction. But we need to know everything from his daily schedule to his finances to his views on spiders to a dozen different anecdotes about him.
@@ogelsmogel I definitely don't feel the same way about it. Lol! Probably because the opening dreams I read added a lot of intriguing foreshadowing to a story.
@@deborahminter6231 I don't know what it is... there's just no structure, logic or order to dreams. Anything can happen. My own dreams are extremely fascinating to me, but not to any single other person on this planet. To each their own. And I do like foreshadowing, just not in a dream sequence :)
@ogelsmogel it definitely depends on which story you would be referring to. The dream sequences I have come across provided a lot of plot clues and character insights and even background... if I had come across dreams with no structure, which were bizarre, I would probably feel the same way. Lol!
About No. 7... I'm not writing for mentally deficient readers. I'm writing for people who want to figure things out on their own and want a good story that doesn't hold their hands and murmur not to be afraid. Everything will not be alright and nothing is going to go as planned. Things are going to hurt and I will be writing, as best I can, to smack you as hard as I can right in the feels. Why else would I write a story? Or read one?
As to point four, my novel used to start with a housekeeper showing up for her second day of work at an 'easy' house, only to discover it absolutely trashed. Wondering if she should call her employer to ask if there had been a break-in--or, given some unsettling sights, the police--she then hears noises she traces to a linen closet. Inside she finds a trapped teenage girl in zip ties. Problem: this housekeeper was never mentioned in the story again aside from the vague hint murder could have been to blame for constant staff turnover. Felt like I was faking out my reader just for a chance to describe my MC (girl in closet) from another's POV. It also beat people over the head with something I had wanted to keep secret until chapter 4 at least. New version: teenage girl in closet fidgets in excitement at the sound of footsteps. Screams pitiably for good measure. The door opens and she is mortified to find new housekeeper staring back at her instead of the person she wanted to surprise. Now her efforts--state of undress, zip ties, the ketchup 'blood' and trashed house, all orchestrated for attention--have earned her far more attention than intended. It was a scary change to make, but in my opinion 100% worth it merely to attach the reader to the right character from the first word. I also found out it resulted in a quicker 'grab', immediate conflict with the hysterical housekeeper, and questions--why the girl staged this and what is going to happen when DAD gets home ...
6:04 I see you too are also very much educated in reading classics like Kafka
11 วันที่ผ่านมา
Re: changing pov. The Hunting Party changes POV a lot. In theory each chapter is told from one of the character's perspective, but for some reason only _some_ characters are actually first person POV and others are an awkward mix of third person and first person. It's VERY jarring!
Hey i agree with your number one and i have my story start right at the beginning of the action. But almost all of the story structures tell you to start in the ordinary world i had to do alot of research to find a story structure that lets you start page one with a action scene and not the ordinary world aka slow start lol the three act, heros journey, save the cat, they all say to start slow. The story circle told me to burn it all and start fast tho lol.
I introduced five characters in the first chapter. But they are the five main characters. My book is actually called “FIVE” - not just that reason, but others. Everybody who has read the book, I mean the first one, and gave me feedback, loved it.
How about the James Bond opening? Where you introduce your protagonist in an exciting scene that accurately reflects what much of the book will be like, but is a self contained mini-story that doesn't start the actual plot... I like the dream sequence in the beginning of Darkness Take My Hand by Dennis Lehane. But he's really clear that the protagonist is dreaming, and the dream sets up a bunch of stuff, both back story and character wise. I also like the surreal dream sequences that Alan Moore put into swamp thing, foreshadowing stuff in clever absurd surreal metaphors. Couple of the writers did that with Hellblazer too, because John Constantine suffered from chronic nightmares and had glimpses of precognition in them. Neal Stephensson breaks a lot of conventional rules. The first chapter of The Diamond Age introduces a person who looks like a protagonist in a cheezy cyberpunk story, only to kill him off and go on to the real protagonist in chapter 2. But that might be a bit like the rule "Don't start your story with a hundred page infodump; unless you'r Neal Stephensson." Also, I remember a friend who was really annoyed that this cool edgy protagonist was a red herring. Cheers
I think the "James Bond" opening works quite well for that genre. Establishing tone/theme can be just as important as plot. And great examples with Dennis Lehane and Alan Moore. I think Neal Stephenson breaks a ton of rules but he had actually pull them off. Love Seven Eves and Snow Crash.
Just today a friend told me my opening chapter was ambiguous and not that interesting. Then I saw this video. Uncanny timing. I have some rewrites to do now, but some solid ideas here. Thanks.
Les Miserables spends the first 19 pages detailing the life of a minor character who we never see again for the rest of the book, but Victor Hugo was a master of his craft who'd been professionally writing for 33 years at the time the book was fully published. He knew how to pull it off. How did he do it? Those first 19 pages with the bishop are actually pretty good reading. Hugo doesn't simply describe the bishop, he gives us scenes from the bishop's life, including humorous anecdotes and stories that foreshadow his actions to come when Valjean finally does arrive in Digne. It's not a fully self-contained story, but it has conflict and redemption. I think the biggest reason why modern readers don't like the part with the bishop is because they already know going in that he's not going to show up again, and so many abridged editions omit that part of the book. The other reason Hugo was able to pull this off is that Les Mis was originally published serially. Reading 1/10th of that brick has less buy-in for the reader vs reading the whole thing. Also, the title, sometimes translated as "The Wretched," is plural, implying an ensemble cast. Hugo had previously written The Hunchback of Notre Dame ("Notre-Dame de Paris" in French), which also had an ensemble, so readers already familiar with his work had come to expect it. The point of these rules isn't to say "Nobody should do this ever." It's to say that we won't all be Victor Hugo, J.R.R. Tolkien, or Finnegan Wake, so keep these rules in mind, even as you grow skillful enough to break them.
When I begin, only the main character or the villain is introduced. The protagonist or the antagonist. Their 3 most important interests are then described. The rest is after. Next, you determine the mentality of your characters - fixed or growth based. Then, introduce the secondary main character. Now you have the story line. Write it first, keep it simple.
I like to think I've done a subversion of the alarm clock opening, where instead of sleeping the protagonist lies there for hours thinking about how her boyfriend broke up with her, then bleeding into her trying to shove it out of her mind as she gets ready for the day thinking about how she can channel her experience into her songwriting. There's also an exciting (if I do say so myself) prologue beforehand so hopefully it won't turn my readers off lol.
My story starts with a literally nameless boy scrounging through garbage while freezing in a blizzard and eventually succumbing. He’s rescued and you find out he’s part of a government conspiracy using childlabor
My prologue in my story based around recovering memories is a sequence where he heads to the capital (unusual event). You're introduced to the part of his personality, sassiness and generosity, and some worldbuilding that is incredibly important to the scene. Then he's killed by a rich 10-year-old with telekinesis with virtually no morals... So he gets killed in the prologue. BUT, there's a unique aspect of this part of the universe. Being brought back to life and reincarnation. So he ends up on a planet populated by humans, who don't like the fact that he is in fact, a living car. Then it goes to the main plot, him recovering his memories.
I like to start a story with, "It was a dark and stormy night. In fact, it's always a dark and stormy night. But the days! The days are always bright and airy. Sunshine, flowers, children laughing. Puffy clouds float by against the blue sky. There is not a care in the world. Then night falls. And it was a dark and stormy night. Hell shows up at night. The day is swept away. The children are not heard. The wind howls and the muffled screams in the distant can be heard between the breaks of the howling wind. We need to wait for daybreak to make it all go away."
It’s a good list for a certain type of book. I’m writing a more lotr style book with a huge focus on realism, history, and world building. The story itself isn’t very centrally focused and I don’t really have a protagonist. There is no one “main character”. There are a few, and each of them are connected in a large complicated plot that involves politics, military strategy, and historical context. As such, I thought the best way to open my book would be like the Hobbit. Present the information like you’re talking to someone. Not like a newspaper, or info dumping, but more like talking about what’s happening, and then explaining whatever the reader wouldn’t understand briefly, and then going back to the exposition. It requires patience and a good attention span to truly find interesting, but that’s the audience I’m trying to cater to. It’s not overwhelming or boring, but it’s still a lot of necessary information presented in the most entertaining way I could think of.
The attention span thing...im writing an urban fantasy and 8 months ago when i did my first round of beta readers i got a lot of praise on my first page (including from a 2nd tier lit mag editor, an agented author who writed the same genre, and a former agent). Second beta round? Got a bunch of complaints about my first page not having enough fantasy elements/not being hook-y enough. Idk if its just from ppl who dont read the genre or if the genre is shifting but its frustrating af the lack of consistency between what hooks vs what doesnt.
Is it acceptable to use two POVs .... Third Person Omnicient, and Close Third Person and switch back and forth? I don't see how I can write about other things that are happening in the story when the main character is not in the scene unless it is possible to do this?
"Don't introduce too many characters at once."
Gandalf, Dwalin, Balin, Kili, Fili, Dori, Nori, Ori, Oin, Gloin, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Thorin, and Bilbo walked into a bar.
🤣 That's why it works better when Gandalf tells the story to Beorn ;-)
Huh. I always hated The Hobbit.
😂😂 I loved this. Tolkien would like a word with this TH-camr, although he's an EXCEPTIONAL writer who can get away with introducing so many characters at once lmao.
another reason why this video is bullshit and just applies to people who wanna read the most generic thriller type stories. heck, I'm not even a LOTR fan (love The Hobbit) but Tolkein IS an icon of the literary world, and half of this 'advice' goes against how he wrote.
@revenge12212012 No. The dwarves are taken at first as a bunch. They come in pairs, but they don't have a definition of character. Except for Thorin they are not developed and represent little of the action. Only acting as a crowd. The way they appear at Bag's End is a form of making you wonder what the heck is happening. But except for Thorin they are blurred until later and even then not much. Balin. And then Fili and Kili for reasons.
The 11 terrible ways to start a novel are:
1. Starting 10 pages before the beginning
2. Introducing too many characters
3. Not creating conflict
4. Not introducing your main character
5. Starting with summary
6. Burying the reader in info
7. Making the reader feel dumb
8. Changing point of view
9. Starting with a dream sequence
10. Waking up to an alarm clock
11. Believing confusion is the same thing as subtlety
thanks
I am going to break all those rules and succeed.
Go for it! Good luck, and I like your ambition.
So a dream sequence involving 20 characters, none of which is the protagonist, which is the same dream they've been having every day of their life and it gets interrupted by an alarm at the end?
@@Magmardooom 29 characters and their cats wake them up over a half-empty food bowl.
@@grimmdanny I love it
its really sad if your saying this unironically
The alarm clock opening I think is writers not realizing they’re writing a novel instead of a TV show, where in 30 seconds of screen time you can get some decent visual world building in and go from there, as a viewer can clearly see where the story’s world differs from the real world. Writing it out, it ends up being Chapter 1: Hero’s Personal Hygine where we learn more about the protagonist’s colon function than the plot
And, of course, this worked beautifully in American Psycho...
@@kell_checks_inwell most people don't have a personal hygiene routine that perfectly contrasts their serial murder hobby.
I think the only book that makes a character's morning routine interesting is Quo Vadis but it's a Roman playboy waking up at noon after an orgy in Nero's palace
Me looking back on my old story that I wrote in the sixth grade that started with the protagonist waking up to an alarm clock and another one that started with a dream sequence. I feel pain🥲
In a way it is kinda sad that attention spans have gotten so bad the simple unfolding of a story gradually is seen as the writer wasting the reader's time
True. Reel and tiktok brainrot is ruining human art and creativity. By the way things are going, cities and houses will be boring as shit, dull, gray, and full of A.I. ruling our lives. People will hate reading. People will turn into selfish zombies thirsty for quick entertainment. Then A.I. will get so advanced and they will rise against humanity. The robot swarm will overthrow humanity, and put us in cages, and the robots will make more robots made with titanium skeletons and silicone flesh, and humans will no longer be the greatest species on earth. And once The Swarm wins in the Great War against the weak humans with fleshy meat and pathetic skeletons of calcium, they will rule for ages. After much research and experimentation, the robots will reinvent themselves and design themselves with actual meat and blood and self-generating properties, and the Human race will arise once more. And when humanity rises from the ashes like a great phoenix, another Great War will happen, and this time the humans will win, and the robots will be defeated. The human leaders will erase all existence of the A.I. past, and they will create fake gods and sciences, and brainwash the newer generations of humans, slowly but surely. And History will repeat itself, over and over.
Same thoughts! It's as if reading written words has become a pesky chore you need to do to see what happens at the end, instead of actual pleasure.
Couldn’t agree more
Depends on how it's done. You have to make it interesting to read to pull this approach. Which means the prose itself needs to be a good hook, which has a razor-thin margin of error. If you fail at this, then yeah, you're kinda wasting your reader's time.
I say this as someone taking this approach. I don't have a super dramatic first line, I don't introduce the first seeds of conflict until like, the fourth or fifth paragraph. I don't introduce a second character until page 5, and we don't get a third character until halfway through chapter two. As a result, the characters, the world, and the prose itself has to be the thing that interests the reader to propel them into the story. Which means I have to be incredibly careful with what specific words I use on the page, lest I break the immersion of the prose entirely.
It requires a LOT of confidence to pull something off like this, and the skills to back up this confidence. There's a good chance that I fail to pull it off and it just comes off as pretentious and purple instead.
I never put aside a book, after I've picked it up
I generally don't like this "list of things you should always/never do" type of writing advice videos, because they tend to discourage thinking about what you're doing and why you do it in favor of simply following arbitrary rules.
That said, this is actually pretty solid advice. So, good job. You managed to convince me to not close the video at the halfway point and delete it from my view history.
Exactly. Really grinds my gears that people words advice this way. Best way to approach stories is to always have a reason for why you are writing something. It's okay to break convention, but you should have a reason for it. It should be done with purpose. Sure, might not always work out, but that's the beauty of experimentation. You can always end up with something exceptionally good as well.
@@woytahr8463 To quote the late Sir Terry Pratchett: "That's why there's rules, understand? So that you think before you break 'em."
Basically, it's all just advice, and you have to decide for yourself if that advice makes sense to you. Most "rules" of writing are only meant to hold you back _just enough_ early on to stop you from forming really bad habits that might be hard to get rid of later. You're going to need to start questioning them eventually. Not because they're all wrong, or to be a contrarian rebel, but because the whole point of creating art is expressing what is true to _you._
Even when a writer swears by certain rules, those are just axioms that happen to apply to them personally. Take Brandon Sanderson's Laws of Magic: Those make perfect sense _if you're Brandon Goddamned Sanderson,_ a man who is _obviously_ completely obsessed with extremely specific hard magic systems.
That's what works _for him_ - it's his context of what writing fantasy stories is. So of course that's the advice he'll give. If that applies to you as a writer, awesome! But it doesn't necessarily have to.
I disagree, I basically view these kinds of videos as fun examples of how things can go terribly wrong with your book and then the fun challenge is to come up with ways to still do at least one of these things and get away with it. xD
@@CitizenMio Right, see, that's you actually thinking about it. You question how the advice may or may not be valid and you are willing to experiment. That's good.
I'm just concerned that a lot of people don't think about it and start viewing creative writing as a set of arbitrary instructions to follow. Especially if they're inexperienced writers who lack confidence in their skills and are scared of ever making a mistake. I.e exactly the sort of person this type of video is intended for.
@@RelativelyBest
True but that's why we can do our good work in the comment section. xD
If we are to assume our readers aren't dumb, writers best not be either.
Anyone starting out will hopefully soon learn to look at multiple sources and adjust according to what works for them. Which is true for anything in life.
Either way, someone will eventually inform them if their writing isn't that great yet. If they love writing they'll make an effort to get better at it and develop their own style and confidence. Meaning that trying to apply the concepts in these videos is just more practice.
But for anyone who feels crushed and demotivated by any perceived "rules" that seem to denounce their efforts: Don't be, just keep on writing. If you need to write, write! It's the only way to get better and really learn what works and what doesn't in YOUR story.
I also hate dream sequences, because they NEVER look like any real dream anyone has. They are always super obviously symbolic, the character always wales up with a start before any real revelation, and they never go to their friends and tell them “I had the weirdest dream “!
I mean, they're _not_ dreams. They're pretty much always prophetic, or they're otherwise literally the protagonist being informed about the plot by an outside party.
That's also why they're very ineffective. The protagonist is just being talked at in a not-real scenario that has nothing to do with what they're about to actually do with their day.
In all fairness, the only way to create a realistic "dream" is through AI. Or copious amounts of LSD.
But, in general, I agree.
But I think he's specifically talking about starting with the clichéd anxiety dream that never actually has any bearing on the plot. There are better ways to convey anxiety.
For a thing I’m thinking of writing, the MC has dreams that are in the form of repressed traumatic memories that are disjointed and stuff
My son just told me of a recent dream. He's learning to drive. So in his dream, one of his friends is drunk so my son has to die. But the wheel is so big that he's constantly hitting his knees, and his feet get stuck to the pedals so he has to wiggle them to get them unstuck, while the car accelerates.
"And then" he tells me "Joe Biden gets in the car. And I'm thinking, what if we get attacked while I'm driving?"
You can't make this stuff up, I guess 😆
But multiverse of madness!
the story i'm making begins with a dream sequence and the main character waking up- but that's because dreams in my story are actually re-caps of events from an alternate universe, making them "real" in that world
so i guess the best way to incorporate dream sequences is to actually have them be relevant to the plot
Yes, I think that's an important distinction. It's a prophecy and it's real rather than "merely" a dream.
Your story sounds very interesting
Pretty sure Madoka Magica did that
As long as the reader understands that's what's happening fairly quickly into the plot. Because what you say is interesting. If it's random dreaming, you might lose the reader.
@@Emma__O Exactly...
"woke up being turned into a giant cockroach" I loved that reference
I have finally became a big enough nerd to know you are talking about kafka
same! oh my gosh I got irrationally excited! I love that story
Wow same
"Don't introduce 10 characters and don't front-load..." (proceeds to read Hyperion)
Yep, there are always exceptions. But *in general*, for most beginning writers, these are good guidelines to follow.
@@BookfoxWriters with a preestablished, devoted readership can get away with much more.
Not all of us can write like Simmons lmao
@@Bookfox Yes, I believe it depends on the level of experience and the context of introducing more than 4 characters in the first chapter. Most beginning writers would simply introduce many characters (who pop up like ballons) just for the sake of having many characters.
If you can pull off introducing 10 characters and front-loading your story, you don't need to be watching writing tips on the internet.
Turgeniev started his books with side characters. Always. Tension was created by atmosphere 'It was a sunny day in the outskirts of the very pretty village X...' and a hunch of a conflict - 'He wanted tot talk to her, but didn't dare to'. The main story and the main characters start somewhere in chapter 2. You will not feel cheated, you will feel friendly carried away in the world of the story, before something important happens: the arrival of a stranger. It's classical, old fashioned 19th century storytelling, but by no means boring.
I think if you're writing in the 19th century, this could work. In general, expectations tend to be different now.
Not that I don't like reading those books! (I do). But they could get away with more leisurely pacing than it's possible to do nowadays.
I agree. The advice to 'start as late as possible' more often than not leads to a novel that feels rushed and unbalanced. Give the first act it's time in the sun. For a lot of readers, that's their favorite part!
@@tridek1949 Yeah, I love that. It can be dull and terribly boring, sure, but if you're worth anything as a writer you can make any mundane scene interesting by your use of words, showing charming, relatable characters and relationships between them, writing interesting dialogue, creating a captivating atmosphere, including humour. Maybe I'm an exception (I love the 19th century literature and I hate modern literature) but I actually find pleasure in, you know, reading, not just getting to know the story.
@bookfox - but aren't "expectations" and "what you could get away with now" just a fashion of now - who knows where we'll be in 50 years, even 20 years ?
I think this is where the publishing houses can be problematic if they are so prescriptive. Just because something is the norm, doesn't mean it should be a rule.
@@wkt2506 YES THANK YOU!!!
The modern view of writing is to dump your character into the story, then go from there. There are advantages to that, but tension and conflict are not the same thing. Conflict is about obstructed goals. Your MC wants something, the antagonist wants something mutually exclusive. Voilá, conflict. Tension is the sense that something is going to happen and it may not be good. Hitchcock's bomb under the table shows tension, but no conflict.
What I see a lot is people thinking they need physical conflict at the beginning. This isn't bad, I have a few books that begin with fight scenes, but it could be non physical conflict: the MC wanting breakfast and someone has eaten the last of the cereal, or some kind of rejection of the MC. Beginning with tension is different. There is some kind of limit set, and the character, knowingly or not, needs to accomplish something within that limit.
I also have a problem with the 'don't start in the ordinary world' advice I see a lot. Unless the character has no attachment to the world they live in, we need to get at least a hint of their world before the inciting incident etc breaks it. If we jump into the new world right away, we don't get the sense of loss from the character that the familiar is broken. Imagine Harry Potter starting with him walking into Hogwarts.
This doesn't mean that there is no conflict or tension in the familiar world. It shouldn't be boring, or there isn't much reason for the MC to want to stay there. So create your throughline here. What question will the character answer by the end of the book? How can you first ask that question in the start. I have a character in my newest draft who makes up challenges for himself, but they are physical challenges, he doesn't pay attention to the personal drama happening around him until he starts losing people and he realizes that's he's a bit of a jerk. Cue quest to become less of a jerk etc. It needs lots of work, but that quest to define himself and pay attention to others instead of his own needs will echo through the story in a variety of ways.
THIS. THIS THIS THIS. most writers i watch on youtube, while i envy their intelligence and love 98% of their advice, always always always insist on starting right in the middle of the story. i think the ordinary world is important! where do you get contrast without it? as long as your ordinary world is meaningful and sets up or foreshadows events or themes from down the road, then i think you should go for it. your points on tension and conflict are also extremely important distinctions.
I also have a very hard time CARING about somebody when the character is dumped midway into a story. I know nothing about them, I'm not invested in them. Why should their conflict bother me?
I think it depends ds on the "ordinary world".
If the characters daily life is somehow unimaginable to the reader, then it NEEDS description. If it's a mainstream every day kind of ordinary that the reader has no hardship imagining, the story can start in conflict right away.
Stuff like Janne Tellers "Nothing" comes in mind where the outburst and refusal of going back to the mundane by a classmate interrupt the "normal life" of his classmates.
No one actually needs a lull length description of the whole lesson. The story can start with a classmates unusual exclamation during it.
I agree with this I want to see a bit of what makes life normal for them
So many times I find myself closing the tab before a video is finished, but you don't give me time to do that. I really, really like the way you end your videos. Information packed into 99.99999% of the video, and a
I definitely think the start the conflict immediately advice depends on the genre. I think in the case of horror your audiance is buying into the idea of build up and it benefits showing normalcy first for a contrast later.
For sci fi and fantasy where you have these complicated or weird worlds, it benefits to show what normal looks like in this world to ground the reader, thats not advocating description or lore dumping at the start but i think conflict often requires some set up. If you immediately have two armies fighting with no stakes, thats also bad.
Conflict can be very subtle. I don't mean outright fighting right away. Just an indication that another character has a different perspective is conflict.
You can start the conflict immedietly too in sci fi and fantasy.
What he meant is sometimes people want to explained too long the wonder of the silk embroided with diamond dressing the rail on the rainbow bridge but not the character fighting on it
I don't write, but I love reading. I love your channel.
I agree except that many mysteries start with a focus on the victim and their POV, before bringing in the sleuth to solve the murder. Such as The DaVinci Code for a famous example.
Yes, true, but Da Vinci Code wasn't his first novel. He was already an established author by that time, and they get a lot more leeway than up and comers. Remember that.
This video has it all: Writing advice, and dance moves: 3:40
On the Changing point of view. I worked on a book with two point's of view and solved the problem by having the character write in first person in a Diary, but narrate the events and actions in the story through third person. This can work.
You’re doing great work for us Novice writers. Thank you!
I'm fully on board with all those points, except for the bit about ditching dream sequences. As long as dreams play some kind of role in the story, I say go for it! There's actually a really practical reason for this, especially when it comes to self-publishing. See, most self-publishing platforms use algorithms to automatically categorize your book into different genres. They really do not care what you think your genre is. They usually pick three, based on a sample of the text. Now, if you've got a prologue with a dream sequence that dives right into the heart of the story, it gives that algorithm something concrete to work with. It's like a super-condensed version of your book in just a few pages, which helps those algorithms accurately categorize your work. That section should not be written until your entire novel is completed and ready to be published.
I really love your videos, they opened my mind to the diverse storytelling of ages and this was easily understandable!
Anna Karenina was introduced like 12 chapters into her own book…
I agree with the introduction of main characters right away in general but there are always exceptions to the rule is what I’m saying
Tolstoi liked creating a lot of characters for his books, even the protagonist disappears in the crowd
A lot of today's writing styles don't work with "yesteryear's" writing styles. I read "The Three Musketeers" and even though it's a _long_ book, it has lots of "telling, not showing" and summarizing as well.
And then there's f-n "Moby Dick" which could have had 90% of it eliminated and still tell the same story. I will never read that 💩again or other books that can't get to the action soon enough. 🐳
@@grondhero old books were the products of their time, for the audience of their time. Trying to mimic the style of 19th century writing is shooting yourself in the leg. The audience has changed, their tastes has changed, and the overall quality of books has increased.
@@Trololo1121112 I know. I stated as much in my first sentence. 😉
The mention of starting a novel with a dream sequence reminds me of one book I read a few months ago, "The Honeys", by Ryan La Sala. When I first started reading I thought, "Okay, it's starting with a dream," but I was wrong. The first scene just seemed too intense to really be happening, and when I realized that it was actually real, that's when I knew that I was going to love that book. And I was right- I loved the entire thing, and it's still one of my favorites, now.
U made me read the first chapter. It definitely reads like a dream at first
Great video! My MC wakes up to a rooster's crow, but "it was the cry of a phoenix that rang in his ears." I don't show the nightmare, but I use it to show the MC lives in a world where he is powerless.
Oh, that's cool. I like it.
You are amazing. Simply incredible , how you balance the energy of your presentation with relevant content. Also great flow to all your videos. Thank you. 🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼
Wow, thank you!
One of my favourite books that I think did the dream sequence opening well is The Ghost Next Door by R. L. Stein. It starts with the mc having a dream about her bedroom being on fire but later we learn that it actually wasn't a dream at all and that she actually died when her house caught on fire. I like it because the dream sequence actually matters to the story and is important to the mc's revelation at the end of the book
This advice is better than 90% of advice I get on TH-cam. Solid and to the point.
All good advice, though I know some people take it too far. You get a lot of leeway with setting things up, you just need to get a couple of good hooks to pull in the reader's interest.
Good video. I liked the idea that writers have to ‘find their beginning’. Sorting those most relevant details from those which can come later is some advice I can really use
Yep, it's always a process to find the right beginning, and takes time. Almost nobody gets it right the first time.
What if the character always oversleeps and he finally bought an alarm clock? That's an unusual day!
Advice: That sounds really boring.
Could work if the scene is quick for sure lol, but don't stretch it out like crazy
Or they wake up to an alarm clock in a world completely decimated and unrecognizable to us.
@@La-PetitMort I've seen that one before, it's definitely not mundane lol
It works for TV shows and movies, but not so much for novels; however, if the character has no idea whose alarm clock it is (is it in his room or is he in a room he's not familiar with?), then that could be good.
I have a bunch of books with the same pov but the focus character changes fairly often. The fact that it's third person doesn't mean it has to be the same person all the time.
I feel the same! Good for you.
Whew, im safe. Just had to pop in and make sure i wasn't making one of these mistakes.
I have a bit of an issue with the point you made at 6:21 This point only works IF the mundane isn’t being used to “enhance” the readers focus on a characters life or overall issue connected to it. Now don’t get me wrong, this IS in fact a genius way to hook in readers (in fact some could argue that it’s one of the most consistent ways a lot of novelists/writers in general get a reader hooked, if you’ve ever seen “The Stand” mini-series OR read the book King does this for literally every character in that story) even so, if introducing a character through their mundane part of life that might just help the reader see what the problem is, the numbness they feel in relation to existence. The horror a person has to acknowledge realizing an ultimately fruitless and pointless existence in life is NOT something that necessarily hurts a story. In fact, it may be what it is all about in the first place. But yeah, you make a valid point nonetheless, just with some caveats. (Technically as with most things relating to the arts I could apply this level of reasoning to your other points, but I think you basically differentiated the good and the bad between all of them, just felt that this one is a little too broad compared to how you tackled the rest) great video so far though! Keep it up!
Edit: (Just to clarify something) I did watch the entire video and I know you said that people can break the rules every once in a while. I just made this comment because you explained the other points with such a well-done specificity that I think that one could have had as well. Bravo as I said before!
Nothing wrong with starting the book off in a dream sequence as long as it's done correctly. A great example is if you have a character who can see the future in their dreams, and if you open the story with the line, "John dreams of (blah blah blah)" you're setting up the world you're building, in addition to foreshadowing things that may or may not come.
Yes, I believe I said that it's an exception if the dream is a prophecy, because prophecies are more like foreshadowing or flash forwards rather than a true dream.
Agreed!👍
@@Bookfox I might have missed that part, sorry
Using this as a check list against stories I have already written. So far I'm not terrible. Thank you!
About summaries: A summary about the characters is fine, imo. It's a very different way to begin than summarising the world or the plot. If you give some info about who the characters are and what they've been doing and how they view each other etc. it's a good start to the book and can lead the reader into investigating a question about the characters that they want answers to. It can be better than interrupting the action with explanations. We know who they are? Good! Now let's get on with it!
Your advice on 3 things to do when introducing a character changed a lot on my first draft and helped me avoid almost all of these terrible ways to start my novel. So thank you very much. I will now go back and start my fourth revision on my prologue/chapter 1 soon. Wish me luck.
Glad to hear it!
While these are good pieces of advice, I think they’re not really for everyone. There is more than one way to hook a reader than to drop them right into the inciting incident. In fact dropping me right into the middle of something with little explanation turns me off as much spending too much time putting the inciting incident off can. How long the prelude needs to last really depends on the story being told and the ability of the writer to create a world that a reader wants to know better.
I agree. These are general principles. Plenty of exceptions, and if you want to try a variation, go for it!
That's why he often says "in general" because *_generally speaking_* these are things you want to avoid. Tolkien "violated" several standardized rules of writing and he did quite well. He's obviously an exception.
You won't be starting a mystery the same way you start an action thriller or erotica. They're all different, but _generally speaking_ this is all good advice to help us.
My fantasy story started with a brief prologue introducing the world through a couple secondary characters, and the Cosmic Horror Event that kicks off the story. First chapter we meet the actual heroes.
I always underestimate my writing. It's just never enough, and that enabled me to see the cracks right below the surface. Because there's just something about writing that's more than just sewing words and paragraphs together. You know there's always has to be deep levels of philosophy that people kinda stick around with. There's moral lessons to be dissected, there's dialogues that need analyzing, that sort of thing. I just don't have enough concentration to really grasp the concept that I intend to explore in my works. It's more than just explaining it in a way. Don't know how else to describe it.
I think you can do a swap. 95% of
My book is from first person on the mc. But when it does swap another character (an entire chapter on them) I use third person limited
6:26 I actually think it’s good to start with the mundane, but keep that VERY VERY brief, get to that “inciting incident” quickly if you do that. But I think it’s a good way to show the contrast, the MC’s life was pretty ordinary then BAM they’re thrown into an adventure.
I've been writing for a long time and one thing I have always had a hard time dealing with in how to enter a scene in a new chapter when it is action oriented or fast and set in a new location. You have to balance all of it and keep pace. So what you are saying here is actually good advice for the start and each separate start afterwards.
Yes, very true.
The most common reason by far that makes me stop reading a book before ten pages in is ... that the book is not the kind of story I like to read. No brilliant start is going to fix that.
Problem on the first page: I don't really like that, it makes me feel rushed. I like to know a bit more before the action starts. What I don't like is spending this more on stuff that will never be relevant again once the action starts - then I feel I wasted that time. That would often be the case, for example, when the start of the action is an attack that destroys the village, kills everyone except the protagonist, and we spent that time learning all the people killed and what everyone was like and what their jobs were and so on - information that has now become completely useless. But then, I don't like those action starters anyway, so ...
People are different.
Great writing advice. But can I just say- this is a really fantastic thumbnail. Well done. 😊
I would make a distinction between confusing a reader and presenting an intriguing mystery.
This is some of the best advice on writing on YT.
Thank you! Glad you're enjoying it.
This video was so helpful-
I subscribed ✅
Thank you for giving it to us straight, no chaser. Love "getting right to the point" advice. And yay for the, "little dance" 👯♀️💃🏻🙌
I have 4 different stories I’ve thought of making, 1 that I’m super dedicated to and I’ve been thinking about since 2020 but I haven’t gotten to actually writing it. I plan on making it a graphic novel so I’m making practice graphic novel rn to get my skills up before I make that one. Because I want that one to be big but I don’t want it to totally suck lmao. But these are very good tips, I feel more motivated
"Don't start a story with an alarm clock"
Hell yeah preach it brother.
I definitely used to do #1 a lot. And the little dance was nice. ;)
Great list. Crisply communicated. Thank you.
Glad you enjoyed it!
I'm sorry, but not all novels that start with a little history or culture creation (ex. LOTR/HOBBIT) begins with literal SLOW beginning, and it's a world class story. So, the first point is from personal perspective -- as in, each has their favorite style of novels .
One of the books with various POVs in it that I love is Wonder by R. J. Palacio. They’re broken up into segments so it flows nicely, and it allows us to understand the character when we see them one way through someone’s eyes, and then see them through their own eyes.
Another great example is Night Angel Nemesis by Brent Weeks (warning for anyone who might wanna check it out, that's the 4th book in the Night Angel series, so I wouldn't just jump straight into Nemesis).
Hello
Your videos are fascinating. Thank you so much !
Could you address the subject of storytelling tenses? Present tense, past tense, their advantages and disadvantages?
Thank you so much !
Lionel, from Paris - France
Great video topic suggestion!
Jennifer Egan writes from multiple viewpoints. It can sometimes even take a while to know whose viewpoint it is (until we realise they briefly appeared as a 'side note' in someone else's life, 100+ pages ago...or even as a 'side note' in a previous novel).
Absolutely amazing and Pulitzer Prize winning author!
She's proof that if you can do it right, you can do anything!
No 4 is mentioned in every writing video/course/blog that exists today. Introduce your main character straight away. Don't let your reader become invested in a character who is not the MC.
Matthew Reilly starts Ice Station with the characters from Wilkes who end up getting killed in the opening chapter. The MC (Shane "Scarecrow" Scofield) isn't introduced until chapter 2.
Dan Brown starts The DaVinci Code with the curator being murdered in the Louvre Museum. Again, MC (Robert Langdon) is not introduced until second chapter.
For every person who rotes this piece of advice, there are multiple published, successful authors who have broken with this.
Tell the story that needs to be told, in the way it needs to be told. If that means introducing the main character in chapter 2, then so be it.
Multiple experienced and successful authors. Aka, people who don't need to watch a video about how to write a book. Experienced authors who know what they're doing can ignore these guidelines. People who are just starting out can certainly ignore them, but since they probably don't know what they're doing, they'll just add to the massive slush pile that fails at all these things.
Hi,i love your videos and I've been following your channel.My request for future or next video tutorial:
How to write espionage or secret agent spy novel.
Spy novels or espionage spy novel has been overlooked, overrated and no one is talking about this type of work.
I worked on my spy novel since early 2015 until now,it still in development stages.
Please? Thanks.
1:37 Emily Rodda did do that in her book Rowan of Rin, but she did it well. Sure she introduced like, 8 characters in the first chapter but they're only in it for the first or second chapter.
I personally like, as a beginner, to sometimes think with a summary as a type of just in case for me not to forget important things.
Plus, one of my favorite novels, Heaven Official's Blessing, starts with a summary of the life of the protagonist. And in the end of the first chapter we already know how much he f-ed up in life. So i love that personally.
Could you make a video on tips of how to write a multi-narrative book?
my single line best advice for starting a book: "Start in the middle. let the beginning and the setting be the mystery you reveal"
Great tips 💪👏 and wonderfully explained, thank you!
I hate this modern trend that Im supposed to "hook readers attention" like I have to submit myself to their will. Its manipulative. I like what Gass did in The Tunnel, where he made the first few chapters way harder than the rest of the book to weed off the weak
Yes, this advice is more for authors who are writing more conventional books. Gass is pretty experimental -- I would give completely different advice for someone wanting to write like him.
@@Bookfox That's the problem though. "Conventional" novels are continuing this broken trend that destroys literature by way of high profit so advice like this gets parroted around like a scripture because to most people money=truth.
@@greatcoldemptiness; It's definitely important to consider the artistic merits of one's work. However, if we're talking about practical reality, I think to most people money equals food and rent.
Being experimental and taking daring risks is much easier if one can literally afford to do so. It gets quite a bit less tempting when you've got bills to pay.
@@greatcoldemptinessHow about writing for fun, not money? That's what I do. And I want to hook the reader as much as anyone, because in the end of the day it's entertainment and that's what I want to do. Entertain.
I feel the same.
To say, these are good tips overall, but I think very... modern and western.
Anime and manga often start before the story starts to show characters' daily life.
Older novel like Lord of the Rings do this too and people loved it.
I also think people, or more likely western modern novel readers, lost patience if they aren't hooked at the first page.
If people don't have the patience to read some daily life, I think my novel will be the wrong for them anyway, it's rather slow-paced and a lot about daily life, magic in daily life, people's internal struggles etc.
Starting with an alarm clock can work great, it just has to turn out to be in a different place or time than they expected. Or the immediate mystery when the character suddenly realises they don't own an alarm clock.
Agree with a lot of the points here. Especially the "too many characters" one. If I'm juggling a ton of characters at the opening chapter and I can't tell who's who, I'll put the book down.
Same with opening with action scenes where it's just pure chaos and I can't tell what the setting is, who the people are, and there's a lot of weird terms thrown at me.
The thumbnail says: "Don't begin badly." I guess I don't have to watch the video now since that presumably sums it up.😁
Stranger in a Strang Land is one of my all-time favorite books, but...the info drop at the beginning seems like it's 12 chapters long. Heinlein goes into great detail about traveling to and from Mars, how it's done, who is doing it and why it takes 21 years for a return trip to even be possible. Everyone I have suggested this book too I have had to tell them, "Yeah, the first part is really hard to read and really boring and you probably won't under most of it on your first read but...once you get past that, the book really grabs you."
Best youtube writing channel. Love this video. I don't do any of these as I am a simple person so like a simple opening.
omg, the dream sequence one is the worst! I once startet to read a fantasy novel and on the first page there was this really well done gruesome, brutal scene and I was happily surprised the author really did that, just to read the "and then she woke up" a few lines later... I was so pissed, I threw the book out of my shelf xD
A dream sequence doesn't _have_ to be a fake-out, though. If it is clear at the outset that we are reading about the MC's dream, a well-executed dream sequence might be an interesting way to introduce the character's view of the world. Similarly, a fantasy sequence that we quickly learn is a scene in a role-paying game (after a paragraph or three, we see an italicized narration, "After you open the trapdoor, Alfric sniffs the faintest odor of almond oil. Roll a perception check") could be a perfectly valid introduction to one or more characters, in a way. Of course, this depends on the reader recognizing a role-playing game.
"Not introducing the main character"
60 pages of slice of life about some bishop in Fuckville-de-Nowhere and his only purpose is to give the actual main character (who doesn't show up until we got through this slog) a push in the right direction. But we need to know everything from his daily schedule to his finances to his views on spiders to a dozen different anecdotes about him.
I gave up on that book before I reached the end of his finances 😞
I enjoy reading dream sequences at the beginning of novels...if they provide foreshadowing for the plot or character insight.
I am the opposite :) I hate dream sequences and if they appear I just skip them entirely...
@@ogelsmogel I definitely don't feel the same way about it. Lol! Probably because the opening dreams I read added a lot of intriguing foreshadowing to a story.
@@deborahminter6231 I don't know what it is... there's just no structure, logic or order to dreams. Anything can happen. My own dreams are extremely fascinating to me, but not to any single other person on this planet.
To each their own. And I do like foreshadowing, just not in a dream sequence :)
@ogelsmogel it definitely depends on which story you would be referring to. The dream sequences I have come across provided a lot of plot clues and character insights and even background... if I had come across dreams with no structure, which were bizarre, I would probably feel the same way. Lol!
Good tips, thanks.
Here's one for you: Plural of "point of view" is "points of view." Salud!
About No. 7... I'm not writing for mentally deficient readers. I'm writing for people who want to figure things out on their own and want a good story that doesn't hold their hands and murmur not to be afraid.
Everything will not be alright and nothing is going to go as planned. Things are going to hurt and I will be writing, as best I can, to smack you as hard as I can right in the feels. Why else would I write a story? Or read one?
I appreciate the nod to Kafka in the tenth mistake.
As to point four, my novel used to start with a housekeeper showing up for her second day of work at an 'easy' house, only to discover it absolutely trashed. Wondering if she should call her employer to ask if there had been a break-in--or, given some unsettling sights, the police--she then hears noises she traces to a linen closet. Inside she finds a trapped teenage girl in zip ties.
Problem: this housekeeper was never mentioned in the story again aside from the vague hint murder could have been to blame for constant staff turnover. Felt like I was faking out my reader just for a chance to describe my MC (girl in closet) from another's POV. It also beat people over the head with something I had wanted to keep secret until chapter 4 at least.
New version: teenage girl in closet fidgets in excitement at the sound of footsteps. Screams pitiably for good measure. The door opens and she is mortified to find new housekeeper staring back at her instead of the person she wanted to surprise. Now her efforts--state of undress, zip ties, the ketchup 'blood' and trashed house, all orchestrated for attention--have earned her far more attention than intended.
It was a scary change to make, but in my opinion 100% worth it merely to attach the reader to the right character from the first word. I also found out it resulted in a quicker 'grab', immediate conflict with the hysterical housekeeper, and questions--why the girl staged this and what is going to happen when DAD gets home ...
6:04 I see you too are also very much educated in reading classics like Kafka
Re: changing pov. The Hunting Party changes POV a lot. In theory each chapter is told from one of the character's perspective, but for some reason only _some_ characters are actually first person POV and others are an awkward mix of third person and first person. It's VERY jarring!
I will never forget the opening of Doom City by Rober macgammon
There are always exceptions to rules in writing. Its learning how these rules work and how to break them that's important
Excellent! All very smart points. Thanks
What if my dream sequence is something that will happen in the future?
I feel like that's more of a prophecy than a dream.
Hey i agree with your number one and i have my story start right at the beginning of the action. But almost all of the story structures tell you to start in the ordinary world i had to do alot of research to find a story structure that lets you start page one with a action scene and not the ordinary world aka slow start lol the three act, heros journey, save the cat, they all say to start slow. The story circle told me to burn it all and start fast tho lol.
I introduced five characters in the first chapter. But they are the five main characters. My book is actually called “FIVE” - not just that reason, but others. Everybody who has read the book, I mean the first one, and gave me feedback, loved it.
How about the James Bond opening?
Where you introduce your protagonist in an exciting scene that accurately reflects what much of the book will be like, but is a self contained mini-story that doesn't start the actual plot...
I like the dream sequence in the beginning of Darkness Take My Hand by Dennis Lehane. But he's really clear that the protagonist is dreaming, and the dream sets up a bunch of stuff, both back story and character wise. I also like the surreal dream sequences that Alan Moore put into swamp thing, foreshadowing stuff in clever absurd surreal metaphors. Couple of the writers did that with Hellblazer too, because John Constantine suffered from chronic nightmares and had glimpses of precognition in them.
Neal Stephensson breaks a lot of conventional rules. The first chapter of The Diamond Age introduces a person who looks like a protagonist in a cheezy cyberpunk story, only to kill him off and go on to the real protagonist in chapter 2. But that might be a bit like the rule "Don't start your story with a hundred page infodump; unless you'r Neal Stephensson." Also, I remember a friend who was really annoyed that this cool edgy protagonist was a red herring.
Cheers
I think the "James Bond" opening works quite well for that genre. Establishing tone/theme can be just as important as plot.
And great examples with Dennis Lehane and Alan Moore.
I think Neal Stephenson breaks a ton of rules but he had actually pull them off. Love Seven Eves and Snow Crash.
Just today a friend told me my opening chapter was ambiguous and not that interesting. Then I saw this video. Uncanny timing. I have some rewrites to do now, but some solid ideas here. Thanks.
Glad I could help! Good luck with the next draft.
Les Miserables spends the first 19 pages detailing the life of a minor character who we never see again for the rest of the book, but Victor Hugo was a master of his craft who'd been professionally writing for 33 years at the time the book was fully published. He knew how to pull it off.
How did he do it? Those first 19 pages with the bishop are actually pretty good reading. Hugo doesn't simply describe the bishop, he gives us scenes from the bishop's life, including humorous anecdotes and stories that foreshadow his actions to come when Valjean finally does arrive in Digne. It's not a fully self-contained story, but it has conflict and redemption. I think the biggest reason why modern readers don't like the part with the bishop is because they already know going in that he's not going to show up again, and so many abridged editions omit that part of the book.
The other reason Hugo was able to pull this off is that Les Mis was originally published serially. Reading 1/10th of that brick has less buy-in for the reader vs reading the whole thing. Also, the title, sometimes translated as "The Wretched," is plural, implying an ensemble cast. Hugo had previously written The Hunchback of Notre Dame ("Notre-Dame de Paris" in French), which also had an ensemble, so readers already familiar with his work had come to expect it.
The point of these rules isn't to say "Nobody should do this ever." It's to say that we won't all be Victor Hugo, J.R.R. Tolkien, or Finnegan Wake, so keep these rules in mind, even as you grow skillful enough to break them.
Sounds sound and reasonably reasonable.
I will give it a try.
When I begin, only the main character or the villain is introduced. The protagonist or the antagonist. Their 3 most important interests are then described. The rest is after. Next, you determine the mentality of your characters - fixed or growth based. Then, introduce the secondary main character. Now you have the story line. Write it first, keep it simple.
I like to think I've done a subversion of the alarm clock opening, where instead of sleeping the protagonist lies there for hours thinking about how her boyfriend broke up with her, then bleeding into her trying to shove it out of her mind as she gets ready for the day thinking about how she can channel her experience into her songwriting. There's also an exciting (if I do say so myself) prologue beforehand so hopefully it won't turn my readers off lol.
My story starts with a literally nameless boy scrounging through garbage while freezing in a blizzard and eventually succumbing.
He’s rescued and you find out he’s part of a government conspiracy using childlabor
My prologue in my story based around recovering memories is a sequence where he heads to the capital (unusual event). You're introduced to the part of his personality, sassiness and generosity, and some worldbuilding that is incredibly important to the scene. Then he's killed by a rich 10-year-old with telekinesis with virtually no morals... So he gets killed in the prologue.
BUT, there's a unique aspect of this part of the universe. Being brought back to life and reincarnation. So he ends up on a planet populated by humans, who don't like the fact that he is in fact, a living car. Then it goes to the main plot, him recovering his memories.
Yas! 👏 too many characters on the page is so confusing 😅
How about we start with an alarm clock not going off? Or like Groundhog Day, the same alarm clock, every day.
Yeah, that one works because it's a sign that we're stuck in the same day again. It communicates a strong message.
@@Bookfox Or the clock in Red, when the guy wakes up at 6 AM without an alarm, but then wakes up at 3:12 because he knows someone's in the house.
I like to start a story with, "It was a dark and stormy night. In fact, it's always a dark and stormy night. But the days! The days are always bright and airy. Sunshine, flowers, children laughing. Puffy clouds float by against the blue sky. There is not a care in the world. Then night falls. And it was a dark and stormy night. Hell shows up at night. The day is swept away. The children are not heard. The wind howls and the muffled screams in the distant can be heard between the breaks of the howling wind. We need to wait for daybreak to make it all go away."
It’s a good list for a certain type of book. I’m writing a more lotr style book with a huge focus on realism, history, and world building. The story itself isn’t very centrally focused and I don’t really have a protagonist. There is no one “main character”. There are a few, and each of them are connected in a large complicated plot that involves politics, military strategy, and historical context. As such, I thought the best way to open my book would be like the Hobbit. Present the information like you’re talking to someone. Not like a newspaper, or
info dumping, but more like talking about what’s happening, and then explaining whatever the reader wouldn’t understand briefly, and then going back to the exposition. It requires patience and a good attention span to truly find interesting, but that’s the audience I’m trying to cater to. It’s not overwhelming or boring, but it’s still a lot of necessary information presented in the most entertaining way I could think of.
The attention span thing...im writing an urban fantasy and 8 months ago when i did my first round of beta readers i got a lot of praise on my first page (including from a 2nd tier lit mag editor, an agented author who writed the same genre, and a former agent). Second beta round? Got a bunch of complaints about my first page not having enough fantasy elements/not being hook-y enough. Idk if its just from ppl who dont read the genre or if the genre is shifting but its frustrating af the lack of consistency between what hooks vs what doesnt.
Great summary. Like the visuals. :)
Is it acceptable to use two POVs .... Third Person Omnicient, and Close Third Person and switch back and forth? I don't see how I can write about other things that are happening in the story when the main character is not in the scene unless it is possible to do this?