Let’s go over 4 things to keep in mind when writing the start of a story, then practice by writing a bunch of beginnings together… based on whatever the Wheel says!
During the last stream, a subscriber requested that we practice writing some story openings.
Remember! A good opening does these four things:
- Set the scene: where/when does this take place?
- Set the tone: how does the character/reader feel?
- Small action: nothing crazy, just *doing* something
- Hook with voice: make it sound like a real person talking
For more info on all four of those, check this out this previous stream: http://scottwritesstuff.com/2020/05/19/how-to-begin-a-story/
After going over that, we got a random DevinatArt image to inspire the start of a story. Chat voted on this one:
Here’s the opening we wrote:
I always had the bad habit of waking up in the middle of the night. At least onboard the Aurora now, there is no night anymore, so I don’t feel as bad.
Of course there’s no day either. No light to drive away the monsters under the bed.
The bed covers feel like they’re tightening around me, suffocating like the padding of a coffin, and I have to get out. Before I even think about it, my bare feet smack against the cold metal floor of my closet-sized chamber, and from outside the thin window, I’m bathed in the blue light of the planet we used to call home.
Pressing my fingers against the glass is cold. My breath comes out as white clouds of cold. Even the mechanical groaning of the Aurora itself is somehow cold. The closest we’ll ever get to hearing the rustling of leaves from a warm breeze ever again.
Next, chat voted on this auto-generated inspiring photo:
And here’s what we wrote for it:
I stood on the edge of the beach and the infinite ocean, watching helplessly as the giant rock devoured my boat.
It had slowly ebbed and flowed in from the horizon, little more than a pebble in the distance, then the size of an elephant. A whale. A freighter on a collision course with one small boat in one small section of one small island in the massive Pacific.
God had looked down and said, “F*ck that guy in particular.”
The crunching of metal and splintering of wood was now only an echo in my mind. Only a few scraps of the SS Breezeway floated on top of the water darkened by the shadow of the now stationary boulder. Imagine traversing the ocean, crushing somebody’s hopes and dreams, and then just staying there. The damn thing was a ten-story-tall dog who’d peed the carpet and was now staring me down as if this was all my fault.
From behind, one of the cult members put a kindly hand on my shoulder.
“Truly God smiles upon you today!” he said. “You’ve been marked by his divine hand.”
His divine hand. I’d heard that sickeningly positive phrase plenty over the past month of studying the People of the Smiling Sun. They’d say it when someone got cancer, for God had paid specific attention to them. They’d say it when the yam crops blighted, for God was testing them.
I balled my sweaty, shaking fingers into fists. I could just imagine their god reeling his Cheeto-stained finger back into the sky, smacking his lips, and clicking on his staticky TV to find some other poor sap to bestow a one-in-a-billion curse upon.
Up to now, I’d watched impassively. But today, I was the one who was going to have to plaster a smile and pretend to not be wallowing in self pity.
“Yes,” I hissed through clenched teeth. “His divine hand. That’s exactly what I thought too.”
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 join us on Twitch.
And you missed the stream, you can still watch them on the YouTube channel or watch the full stream reruns.
Hope to see you next time, friend!
Featured image: Unsplash