For the last stream, we went over how to fix one of the most common writing mistakes: setting the scene/tone at the beginning of your story.
As opposed to movies and video games that are visual mediums, written stories only have the words on the page to get across the pictures/feelings into your head. So while stories and video games can use images and music to help set the scene/tone, for a story, you have to do it manually.
This means while it’s tempting to start off a story with action, it’s not always the best choice. Usually it’s better to start by taking some time to establish the who, what, when and where, so that the reader can visualize what’s going on. You could have the most heart-pounding opening ever, but if we can’t see it/feel it, then we’re not going to care.
To show this, we wrote the beginning of a story two ways: (1) where we set the scene/tone poorly, and (2) where we set the scene/tone better. Here’s what we came up with:
Set the Scene/Tone POORLY:
Henry’s boss had ordered him to do the one thing he couldn’t do. He wished he hadn’t lied about it on his resume. He thought back to the day when he’d turned it in, thinking it wasn’t a bad idea at the time. But now he had no other choice. He sighed to himself and left his office, ready to do what he needed to do.Set the Scene/Tone BETTER:
In the backstage of the theater, Henry was sitting in front of a mirror putting on his makeup. It was a tiny theater, crammed full of dusty outfits and old stage props. The air was full of musk, bright lights, and excitement as the other actors and stage crew dashed back and forth, hurrying in and out of costumes, and whispering orders into their microphones.Henry smiled at himself in the mirror. His clown makeup was spot on. Ever since he’d fallen in love with theater in high school, he’d dreamed of this moment his whole life: performing in front of an audience that wasn’t made up of his classmates and family. Sure, it may be a rinky-dink little off-off-off Boradway theater in the middle of Newark, New Jersey, and they may be performing a weird circus show that he’d never heard of before he’d seen the script, but he was still getting paid. That meant he was officially a professional actor.
A thick hand on Henry’s shoulder shot him out of his daydream. In the mirror, he could see his boss Arman standing behind him – a short, balding man dressed entirely in black with a constant scowl on his face. Henry had thought he was angry all the time when he’d first met him, but that wasn’t the case; he was just incredibly passionate about theater, and he was very particular about putting on a good show for the audience. The red pen marks all over the papers on his clipboard and the microphone headset that never left his mouth were a tribute to that passion.
“Henry,” Arman growled. “Bad news. Claire’s sick. She can’t go on tonight.”
Claire was my partner clown in the upcoming scene. She’d been quiet and a little off all night, and I saw her run out to the bathroom twenty minutes ago. She still hadn’t come back. Guess things weren’t going so hot for her tonight, but I didn’t mind. That’d just give me more of the spotlight!
“Not a problem,” I said, trying to reassure Arman as best I could.
He nodded and flipped through the papers on his clipboard, until he finally stopped at one that I recognized: my resume, complete with my beaming headshot attached in the corner.
“Good,” Arman said. “Also, since Claire won’t be on stage, I need you to do her juggling scene. It says here you can do that, so not a problem, right?”
My cheeks burned bright red beneath the white makeup. My stomach dropped into my legs as I realized with horror my mistake: I’d written on my resume that I could juggle, hoping to make myself more appealing. The unfortunate truth was that I could barely even hold three bowling pins at once, much less toss them in the air and catch them.
I felt my acting dreams shatter to the ground.
Which beginning did you think was most interesting? To me, the first one felt very vague, like it was taking place in a cloudy void, whereas the second one is extremely clear, both visually and emotionally.
What’s more, the second one is better paced as well, as a result of taking its time to establish the scene/tone. It’s certainly not perfect, but I’d be excited to keep reading and see what happens to Henry!
You can watch us explain the exercise and read the final story here.
After that we did a writing prompt and chat voted for this one submitted by Agent_Galahad: Your train reaches its last stop. “Train terminating, please disembark,” the voiceover says. You decide to hide and see what happens. The voiceover speaks again, garbled, “Train now departing, direct to-” The end of the message was too garbled and glitchy to understand. The train begins moving.
This was one of the most difficult prompts we’ve done. First, it was hard to decide how we were going to interpret what was happening. Was it magic? Monsters? Aliens?
Then, once we decided on that, we had to make sure the story had both a satisfying setup and payoff. It was an extremely difficult write, but honestly this is one of my favorite pieces we’ve done on the stream, so I think it was worth it.
If you want to join us and help write a story by trolling in chat, or share your own writing for feedback, then we’d love to have you. We stream on Twitch every Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday at 7:30pm-10:30pm (U.S. Eastern Standard Time).
And you missed the stream, you can still watch Rubbish to Published, the writing exercises, or the writing prompts on YouTube, or watch the full stream reruns until Twitch deletes them.
Hope to see you next time, friend!
Scott Wilson is the author of the novel Metl: The ANGEL Weapon,
forthcoming November 2018.
Featured image: Flickr/Ben Stanfield