YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE Stephen King to start your narrative with something scary. You don’t even have to be writing a horror story. Maybe you just want to grab your reader’s attention right away. Starting with a scary scene or description not only grabs a reader’s emotion—which is a wonderful way to keep them…
The Cold Open – Begin with a question
WHEN YOU BEGIN your novel using certain techniques—such as “In media res” (in the middle of the thing) or “At the last possible moment”—you are deliberately planting a question in your readers mind. In the first instance, the question is “What is going on?” and in the second, “What will happen now?” These are great…
Just received my ARC!
A big box of Advance Review copies came in the mail last week. I’m totally thrilled! It’s 1838, and May Bedloe works as a seamstress for her cousin, the famous actress Comfort Vertue—until their steamboat sinks on the Ohio River. Though they both survive, both must find new employment. Comfort is hired to give lectures…
The Cold Open – Start at the Last Possible Moment
THIS IS THE MOMENT WHEN, in your story world, everything has changed. The stranger has come to town, the father has died, the mother has left, the best friend has announced that she’s moving to Pakistan. Like In Media Res, in which you begin in the middle of the action, this technique relies on triggering…
The Cold Open – in media res
STARTING A NOVEL, writing that very first sentence, is as exhilarating and intimidating as riding a bicycle for the first time without training wheels. Many new writers think they need to explain a good deal more than they need to explain. They think that the first chapter is about laying a foundation so that the…