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A Good Beginning Starts With Action
Author: Arline Chandler
Lee Roddy, creator of the Grizzly Adams series (www.leeroddybooks.com), says every writer should make a sign in bold letters and tape it above his or her computer: PLOT IS A VERB. He’s talking action, and action appears in the opening scene of every effective story or book. Some writers call that action “the hook,” meaning that the reader must be “hooked” on the character’s problem in order to want to read past the first page.
Roddy continues, “In the beginning of a story introduce the setting, mood, character, and a PROBLEM. Get to the problem immediately, especially in a children’s story. Establish in the beginning what your character wants.”
Effective beginnings start in the middle of the story, in the midst of conflict or unanswered questions. Building up to the problem takes too long for today’s young readers. They want to be thrust into the tension at the beginning.
Nancy Lamb in her book, Writer’s Guide to Crafting Stories for Children, gives several considerations for the opening of a book or story. First, she says to give the reader a sense of what the book is about and the conflict. Let the character talk, revealing his distinct voice. The main character may be tough. Show that in his dialogue. Or through dialogue or an incident, pose questions to be answered—so readers will keep reading. Uncover or hint at the problem.
Always anchor the story in time and space. If your character has to shout over the roar of ocean waves, he obviously is on a beach or a ship. But characters were on beaches and ships since the beginning of time. If he throws line from a fishing rod and reel, he obviously is in more recent times. However, if he helps to haul a net filled with fish over the side of a wooden boat, then readers can surmise that he lived some decades ago. Think about how you can show these details without telling them.
In writing my young adult novel, The Unhuntable Bear, (in progress) I began my story with my character, Will, observing his Pa and neighboring mountain men from his perch in the cabin’s loft. The men are discussing how they could kill the old bear that terrorizes families in their valley. Way too tame, children’s writer, Betsy Haynes told me at a writer’s conference. “Start with action—in the middle of something,” she said. I wrote a new first chapter with my 14-year-old Will trying to single-handedly kill the old bear and creating a landslide that allowed the bear to escape from his Pa and the neighbors on the chase. Since my hero’s “want” is to prove to his Pa and the other men that he has reached manhood, the new first chapter deepened Will’s dilemma.
The late Lee Wyndham, author of Writing for Children and Teenagers gives a simple tenet for capturing the young reader’s attention in the beginning: “Present characters in whom your particular reader is likely to be interested, doing something which is likely to interest him.” The key word is “doing,” as in action. However, Nancy Lamb warns that when you begin with action, don’t throw a slam-bang scene at the reader before he knows who is fighting and for what he is fighting.
Wyndham advised: “Introduce your character by his full name, and indicate his personality and background. If you must open your story with only one character in the scene, show him doing something before he begins thinking. You can simplify your characterization by having an animal with him, a creature he can talk to or pet.”
Nancy reminds us to hint at the solution to our hero’s problem even in the beginning. For example, is basketball going to be important in the hero’s final outcome? Then have him at least bouncing a basketball in the beginning.
Lamb adds, “When an author plants something—the knowledge of certain skills or special characteristics of courage, stubbornness, perseverance, or curiosity—the reader is convinced when these attributes lead the hero out of certain situations.”
She goes on to say that the points she outlines, as well as those mentioned by Lee Roddy, must be covered quickly and effectively in order for a beginning to be complete.
Browse children’s books at your local library for different types of beginnings. Analyze how the writer gets into the problem of the main character. Then write several versions of your own story’s beginning.
This column first appeared on DM in 2009, but we think you'll agree that it still has some good information!
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