“Every saga has a beginning.” – Star Wars
Deciding on a beginning is a problem for a lot of authors. Many don’t recognize that there’s a difference between “where the story/plot starts” and “where the book starts,” and therefore don’t realize that the two things aren’t firmly tied together.
Stories about happy people happily being happy, or miserable people miserably being miserable, are not very interesting to most people because nothing much happens. Stories start when something in the main character’s life changes. Cinderella’s story starts either when her mother dies and her father remarries, or when the Prince announces the ball, depending on whether the author thinks she’s been a scullery maid long enough for that to qualify as her status quo. The story of the first Star Wars movie starts when Princess Leia gets hold of the plans for the Death Star and races off to deliver them to the rebels. MacBeth’s story starts when he runs into three witches and hears their prophecy.
Books, movies, and plays don’t necessarily open at the point where the story starts. The first Star Wars movie, for instance, opens in the middle of the space battle as the Empire tries to capture Princess Leia’s ship. MacBeth doesn’t run into the witches until Act 1, Scene 3. Many versions of the Cinderella tale do begin with her mother’s death, but a few start before that, and many others start just before the arrival of the invitation to the Prince’s ball.
Those examples illustrate the four standard places to look at opening a novel or short story: just before, just as, or just after the story starts, or in medias res when the character is busy dealing with the first round of fallout. To put it another way, the first scene of a book or novel can show the character’s status quo – the life they are living before the change that starts the story/plot. The first scene can show the moment the change happens and the story begins. The opening scene can show the moment just after the change occurs and the story begins. Or the opening scene can skip all that and dump the reader into the story well after things are underway.
(If you really want to get into things, you can start a novel anywhere, including with the last scene in the story, but if you do that, you’re also playing with structure and nonlinear storytelling, which is outside the scope of this post.)
All four of the possible novel-opening points have their uses. Opening just before things change gives the reader a chance to see what the character’s life looks like before it gets disrupted. It’s particularly useful when the story has a setting or an initial situation that readers aren’t likely to be familiar with (as with much fantasy, science fiction, or an unfamiliar historical or cultural setting), or when the change is an unexpected catastrophe like a forest fire destroying their home (because it lets the reader see what the character has to lose). It also gives readers a chance to get to know the character before things hit the fan. It is, however, easy to run on longer than necessary. Spending too much time with Cinderella and her mother or Cinderella the scullery maid can quickly start looking like “happy people happily being happy” or “miserable people being miserable,” which will make a lot of people put the book down before the story starts.
Opening just as the change occurs, or shortly after, tends to work best when the character’s status quo is likely to be familiar to readers, really obvious from the situation, or not really relevant to the rest of the story (as when the change is moving to a new city and leaving the character’s old life entirely behind). Some Cinderella retellings open with the stepmother or one of the stepsisters announcing that she’s heard the Prince is having a ball, or with the arrival of the invitation, which I would call a “just as things change” opening. A few start with the stepmother forbidding Cinderella to go to the ball, which I’d call “just after things change.”
Opening in medias res is most common in action-adventure stories, or in a particular sort of story where the author wants the reader to be confused or befuddled for a while. Regardless of the reason, dumping the reader straight into a scene where something significant is going on, without giving said reader any context or background about why this is significant, is usually trickier than it looks. It will put off some readers and draw in others, so you want to be sure that the ones you put off are the ones who wouldn’t like the story anyway, and the ones you draw in are the ones who will love it. Cinderella retellings that open with the appearance of the fairy godmother, or with Cinderella’s arrival at the ball, are definitely opening in medias res; they often work mainly because most people are already familiar with the story.
(One could also open a Cinderella retelling with her limping home through the mud after the coach turns back to a pumpkin, and give the rest of the story as flashback, which again gets into nonlinear storytelling territory.)
Which kind of opening scene a writer chooses depends on how they want to focus their story.
Another option would be to have a frame story, which I understand was once common enough to have been a standard, but isn’t anymore. I suppose it might now count as a nonlinear form. (A Cinderella retelling where Queen Mother Ella makes her grandson sit down for an explanation of just why he ought to attend to his dancing lessons.)
Ooops! I’d always thought of my novelette Perilous Chance as beginning in medias res, but now I’m realizing that it starts too near the end for that to be the case. It’s not exactly the very last scene, more like a vignette from the climax, but it surely must qualify as non-linear storytelling.
As I think I’ve figured out, ancient Greek drama required unity of time, of place and of something else. The story had to happen in real time on the stage with one set.
So the story of Oedipus starts as he’s about to marry this older lady. (Spoiler alert). and he tells of this prophecy that he was to kill his father and marry his mother. Then the lady tells that her son was sent away because of a similar prophecy. Then he tells …
I think there’s 3 hours of flashback/recounting.
The allegedly Aristolean unities were time, place, and theme. In reality, Aristotle brushed on time — saying that the best plays covered a period of no more than a day — and never mentioned place. But theme, theme he harped on.
And of course, there’s yet another difference between where the book or the story starts — and where you start as a writer.
I don’t think I’ve ever started with the opening scene. Sometimes the inspiration was of an incident very near the beginning — sometimes very near the end, though. And sometimes it’s not even part of the plot.
There’s a saying in musicals that you write the opening number last. It has wider applicability.
I always revisit the beginning before writing the ending, to see if there’s any particular element I want to echo, to make the work feel like it’s come full-circle.
Reading this, I realized that I started my first novel with what looks like before the story starts (people sitting around doing mundane tasks), but is actually in media res (the mundane tasks are a brief respite in a pursuit that’s been going on for years). Huh. Wasn’t that clever of me, says the cat who totally meant to fall off the back of the couch.
Deep Lurker’s “. . . where Queen Mother Ella makes her grandson sit down . . .” frame story — I love it.
Rick
A good rule: if you lapse into the past perfect a lot in your first pages, you did something wrong. It MAY just be infodumping too much too soon, but it often indicates — you started too late.