by Anne R. Allen
Clichés exist for a reason. A whole lot of people like them. That means they get over-exposed. Clichés represent a natural way of thinking. So don’t feel bad if your first draft has a clichéd opener. It’s part of the process.
Here’s the most important thing for a new writer to know about composing the opening scene for your novel or memoir:
WRITE THE FIRST CHAPTER LAST
That’s right. I know writers who have agonized for months — even years — over a first chapter, never going on to tell their stories. Don’t do this. Instead, write a place holder. You’ll get to fix it later.
By the time you’ve written the ending of your first draft, you’re going to have a fantastic, original take on your novel’s opener. You may decide to lop off the first (and / or second and third) chapters altogether. Or you’ll realize that the story should have started earlier rather than later than you originally thought.
That’s what happened to me with Ghostwriters in the Sky. I started the story too late, after Camilla had started her adventure. It took a good editor to point out that the story needed to start earlier. Readers needed to meet Camilla when she was in her native habitat in Manhattan. Then when she got the phone call inviting her to the wilds of California cowboy country, the story was off and running. No way could I have written that opener when I was writing the first draft.
So when you’re writing your first draft, jump right into your story and keep writing. Don’t worry about creating a great first chapter until after you’ve written “The End.”
How to Write the First Chapter of Your First Draft
This is how you start writing your novel or memoir: do whatever the heck you want.
That’s right. Go ahead and write down anything that comes into your head. Don’t even think about clichéd openers.
- Describe the protagonist’s bedroom for pages and show her eating her morning cereal, bite by bite.
- Flash back to her childhood, when her uncle Borysko fed her weird buckwheat porridge for breakfast.
- Then flash back inside the flashback to explain why her uncle, brought up in an orphanage in Kiev, has such strange food habits
- Describe the weather in Kiev and the horrors of living in the cold, dark, stone building, existing on cold cabbage soup and dumpster-diving for half-eaten pierogi.
- Then you can go into a bit of historical background, telling how St. Hyacinth of Poland is the patron saint of pierogi, although pierogi were probably invented in Ukraine.
Write it all down. Every word that pops into your head. Sometimes you have to write volumes as you get spurts of imagination and get to know your characters. Those opening scenes can be tension-free and boring to everyone but you.
That’s because all those words are for you, not the reader. You’re probably going to delete 90% of that first chapter — and maybe the next three chapters — in revision, but it doesn’t matter. (But don’t throw those words away. Keep them in a folder for outtakes. You never know when you can plug that stuff about St. Hyacinth into another chapter or story.)
You may need to go through the experience of writing down all that description and backstory in order to get your juices flowing and truly understand your character.
But When You Revise — be Aware of the Following Clichéd Openers.
I’m not telling you that it’s wrong to use one of these openers. In fact, they have become clichéd openers because they feel so right.
Unfortunately, they’ve felt right for so many authors, readers are sick of them. If you use clichéd openers, you need to be really creative in the way you present them.
If you open with a funeral on a rainy day, maybe make it a funeral for Uncle Borysko’s pet iguana. And maybe it’s raining ash from the nearby volcano that hasn’t erupted since before the last ice age.
Here are some classic clichéd openers too many writers have done already:
1) Weather Reports
Let us know the plot before we worry about whether to take a raincoat. In your opener, give a sketch of the setting in a sentence or two — and don’t make us go through page after page before we get to the story.
Later, once readers are hooked on the story and care about the characters, they’ll be more interested in the rainfall statistics of northern Ukraine.
2) Trains, Planes, and Automobiles
This is one I often used in my early writing — a character is en route to the scene of what will be the inciting event. This is a great opportunity to give your protagonist some serious musing time, which will provide the reader with a bunch of necessary backstory, right?
Uh, probably not. But I understand the temptation.
We want to show our protagonist doing some deep thinking as she drives to the remote goat farm her uncle left her. Or maybe she can have an info-dump conversation with the tall dark stranger sitting next to her on the plane. Or she can talk about her uncle with the mysterious Ukrainian woman she dines with on the train.
Unfortunately, readers are going to think we’re vamping. To them, we haven’t started the story yet. What you need to do is start the story later, when she has arrived at the goat farm, or earlier, when she hears about her uncle’s will. But cut the travel time to a minimum of musing/infodump opportunities.
3) Funerals
Because so many people’s lives are changed or uprooted by a death, it’s a great place to start, right? A huge number of novels — and even more memoirs — start with the protagonist in a state of bereavement. If you use this opening, make sure you’ve got a fresh take. Like the iguana funeral.
Or maybe your protagonist is a serial killer who likes to go to the funerals of his victims?
Or there’s a mysterious Ukrainian woman who invites a bunch of strangers she met on the train to her own funeral.
4) Dreams
This is where the reader is plunged into the middle of a rip-roaring scene, only to find out on page five that it’s only a dream.
I know why new authors write this opener. Writing gurus tell you to start out with conflict. So why not begin with the protagonist fighting a dragon and his witchy consort, a gigantic were-weasel named Popazilla? And just as our hero is going to be forced to dive into the boiling Lake of Doom, he wakes up and he’s late for baseball practice.
Here’s the problem: if — just when the reader is starting to get into the story — you say “never mind” and toss him into a mundane world, he’s going to be seriously annoyed. Like annoyed enough not to buy another one of your books.
5) Conditional Perfect Narration
“If only I’d known…” or “If I hadn’t been…”
Starting with the conditional perfect seems so clever — I used to love this one — but unfortunately a lot of other writers do too.
If you’re writing comedy, you may get away with this. It’s still a nice set up for a joke. But be aware it’s well-trodden territory.
6) Personal Introductions
Starting a novel with, “Hello. My name is….” has been so overused that a lot of readers won’t go any farther. Especially in YA fiction. Resist the temptation.
7) Group Activities
Don’t be tempted to start with a crowd scene. Those can work in film because the camera can immediately focus on your protagonist. But in a novel, too many characters in the opener will confuse the reader.
I did this once in what I intended to be a second book in a series. I started with a room full of the characters from the last book. Not one of my beta readers could figure out what was going on.
Give your readers a break and only give them 2 or 3 characters to learn about in the opening scene.
8) Musing
Beginning authors love them some internal monologue. I sure did. I remember the stony faces in the workshop where I read my novel opener that consisted of a whole chapter of a Baby Boomer musing about the state of her generation.
The workshoppers were not kind, but they taught me a must-needed lesson.
9) The Mirror Scene
This is when the protagonist looks at herself in the mirror, and describes her looks in loving detail. Beginning authors figure this is the best way to describe the protagonist without hopping into another character’s head.
But as somebody pointed out in a “reader pet peeves” survey, real people “look in the mirror and — usually — think ‘God, I look like crap.’” The readers also didn’t believe people muse about their “lush, wavy auburn hair, thick eyelashes and full lips” when they’re on their way to a crime scene.
And the truth is you don’t need as much physical description of the characters as you think. Just give us one or two strong characteristics that set them apart. Let the reader’s imagination fill in the blanks.
10) Action, Action, Action
Yes, they tell us to start with a bang. But if too much banging is going on before we get to know the characters, readers won’t care.
That big battle scene; the attack by a herd of flying elephants; the epic fight between Trekkie vs. Star Wars nerds in the lunch room — those can all be great scenes, but save them until the story gets on its feet and we know the main characters.
11) The Alarm Clock — Queen of Clichéd Openers.
This is when the novel opens as the protagonist wakes up in the morning and prepares for his/her day. Readers are over it.
Whether your characters are preparing to slay dragons, spy on Nazis, or face the mean girls in the school cafeteria, avoid starting with them waking up.
Or if you do, this is the scene you lop off in revision.
Nobody cares about tooth-brushing, or how the toilet looks when it flushes. Move along to where your character is wide awake and actually facing the challenge of the day.
***
Of course, if you use one of these openers in an especially clever and original way, you may delight your readers. But be aware these openers are overdone.
by Anne R. Allen (@annerallen) August 15, 2021
What about you, scriveners? Do you write your opening chapter last? Have you ever written any of these clichéd openers? Are there any other clichéd openers that you’re tired of?
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Excellent advice from Anne. As usual. Heed her words!
And once you’ve avoided cliches, ditched the dream, ixnay-ed the weather, don’t think you’re finished. Because you’re not. There’s One More Thing: that all-important first sentence of the first chapter. Here are a few thoughts (with stellar examples) to inspire you. https://annerallen.com/2018/04/how-to-write-a-great-first-sentence/
Ruth–Thanks!! I should have linked to that wonderful post of yours on first lines. It’s full of great advice!
Really chuckling here, Anne, this is all so well pointed. I hardly read anything set in the Alleged Real World, but I’m going to point my lovely wife at this column and I’m sure she will reminisce with a smile about your list.
I advise beginning authors with that great line by Somerset Maugham (and apparently others) “There are three rules to writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.” I try to pull their thoughts over to the characters first and foremost, asking them not to assume that the reader will care and encouraging them to give us reasons to like them.
Beyond that, I would guess that any writing rule can be broken, any cliché flogged, any overdone phrase done again, as long as you can prove to the reader that you did it on purpose.
Will–That Maugham line is probably the single most important piece of writing advice ever written. 🙂 And yes, it’s true that you can do anything as long as it’s done on purpose. It also helps to call it “literary.”
My next book begins with a funeral, however brief, so hopefully I did it right and readers like it.
Alex–Actually, I originally wrote “a funeral for your uncle’s iguana–in space” but left off the last bit because of wordiness. But if your funeral is in space, like most of your stories, then it won’t be a cliché. 🙂
What? Pierogi actually originated in Ukraine?
Ha!
Great tips, Anne. We’d all do well to staple this post to the wall above our computers.
CS–Well, that’s what Uncle Borysko says. There is some dispute about the origins of those tasty pastries.
“Write the first chapter last” is something I wish I’d had stapled on my wall a few decades ago. I have at least a dozen first chapters I worked on so hard I couldn’t get the energy to go on with the book.
Excellent tips, Anne, and such an entertaining read! Sharing!
Jodie–Thanks much for sharing. 🙂
Hi, Anne
I have opened with the weather because it’s part of the setting and was important in the story. If the characters are outside, weather is most definitely part of the characters’ interaction with the setting. It can’t not be. They see light, or dark; they feel rain spattering them; they hear the rain tapping in the oak leaves above their heads; they smell the ozone in the air of the coming thunderstorm; they taste the rain in the air. It gets a bad rep because beginners do mugshot-style weather and don’t anchor it to the characterization or the opinions of the characters.
It’s one thing to say, “It was sunny out and the day was heating up”–very generic and fake, versus, “The brightness made me squint. Barely eight a.m. and heat already rose up around my ankles from the asphalt. Maye I should have worn shorts, but I didn’t look like much to start with and I needed all the respect I could get.”
Linda–If the weather is affecting the protagonist’s state of mind and actions, it’s useful. If all we get is a disembodied voice telling us it was a dark and stormy night, especially if the weather report goes on for pages, not so much. 🙂
Another funny and educational post by Anne.
I would argue in genre fiction, like sci-fi, action opening are expected by readers. However, the best authors use the action to show character, keep it short, and explore the repercussions throughout the rest of the novel.
Again, great post, Anne. I learn so much from you.
Ingmar–That’s why I repeated “Action” three times. It’s an overabundance of action that readers object to. If they don’t know who it is who’s battling the Lizard People from Betelgeuse, then the reader isn’t going to be interested in the battle. Especially if they can’t tell if they should be rooting for the Lizard People or the Starfleet troopers. 🙂 A little action is great. A prolonged scene with no characterization is tedious no matter what the genre.
I’ve actually opened one of my published books with the ever popular telephone conversation. However, it worked because it actually set the tone as well as the entire purpose of story.
Fortunately, this is the only time I’ve used a cliche opener for a published story.
I did try to write a bad opening paragraph for a story that a character had to proof for somebody, using the popular Snoopy beginning (you and everyone here knows what contest I’m talking about), but dang everyone in my writing group thought it worked out well.
G. B. I knew I left something out. It was telephone calls!! Thanks. That should have been #12. I have run into three mystery novels with phone call dialogue openers recently. One worked, two didn’t. It’s partly because phone dialogue, even more than regular dialogue, is disembodied. We can’t see the person on the other end of the line, so we can only really “meet” one character. I’m glad you got yours to work.
I’ve tried the “Dark and Stormy Night” contest a few times, but I never wrote anything bad and silly enough to submit.
Excellent as always, Anne. Love a cool new twist on an old tired cliche, but they can just as easily fall flat. Writer beware. Break this *rule* at your peril.
I always write my opener after completing the first draft. Even though I’m a planner, not a pantser, it’s much easier to fill those first few pages without the added pressure of perfection. Start late, end early. 🙂
Sue It is sooo much easier to write that opener when you know how it ends, isn’t it?
You’re right that it’s dangerous to try to freshen a cliche when you’re a newbie. Maybe we need a sign that says “You have to be a writer for THIS long before you take this literary ride.”
Another keeper, Anne! I am marking final manuscripts now, and -you guessed it – some still start with a dream even though I thought I hammered away at that one til it was one sorry nail for a coffin!! It’s just so tempting, I guess. Great post as usual!
Melodie–I don’t know why dreams are so tempting, but they sure are. I’d say half the newbie manuscripts I edited started with a dream. The other half started with the dreaded alarm clock. 🙂
When I was eight years old, all of my “novels” (heavily plagiarized from my favorite horse stories) began with the alarm clock. Since then, my work has improved considerably in style and originality. 🙂
My family is from Kiev, so those openers would absolutely have me hooked! There’s few more effective ways of getting my attention than talk of pierogies. But I suppose I’m in the minority there.
I loathe writing first chapters. I can muck around in the middle just fine, and the ending usually flows from the pen as if it were always meant to be just so… but I just cannot properly start a story. I feel like adding a big author’s note at the beginning: “Reader, I know the beginning is crap, please just stick with me for 20 pages and I promise it’ll be worth it!” But at least with this post I’ll know some things to avoid in my eternal battle with Chapter 1!
Irvin–So your name is Ukrainian? I wondered if any Ukrainians would read this and weigh in on the origins of the pierogi. Wherever they came from, they are seriously yummy. Maybe if you put a pierogi in your opening chapter, it will start “cooking”? I feel your pain. First chapters aren’t easy.
Good Sunday afternoon, Anne & Ruth. A bit late to the party today. I’m on the fence about writing openings first or last. My usual MO is to open with the central story question. One of my based-on-true-crime books begins with dialogue where a female detective named Harry asks her male partner, “WTF happened to them?” Only the phrase is not abbreviated. Seems a bit over the top for an opener, but you had to know Harry and I try to be true to the characters.
A tip I was told about openers has nothing to do writing openers. It’s to have your cover made as soon as you start writing the manuscript. The psychology is that you sit there looking at the final product and it motivates you to move on. Also, you’ve already paid for the product so you better get it published. And that’s all I have to say about that. Enjoy your days!
Garry–Very interesting about the cover art. I actually went searching for some images when I started my current WIP. Not that my publisher is going to design a cover before they see the ms. but I did want a picture in my head.
Harry sounds like a great character!
Yeah, Anne, Harry’s quite the character. She was my detective partner for four years, and she was great to work with. A bit of a rough diamond, though. Harry’s a big gal with big hair and an even bigger personality. We nicknamed her “Harry” after the bigfoot/sasquatch in the movie “Harry and the Hendersons”. Harry’s retired from the force, like me, and is now a local city councillor where she trainwrecks public policy.
I often use you advice to write whatever part of the story has gripped me the hardest. This gets my manuscript off to a flying start. Later, like assembling a jigsaw puzzle, I figure out where that scene fits.
Leanne–I know some excellent writers who compose in that jigsaw style. It works for them too. 🙂
I do this too! And usually it’s the opener. I love writing openers, even though they’re usually awful in 1st draft.
In my second novel, what had begun as the first chapter ended up relocated as Chapter 8 or 9. As the story progressed during writing, the muse made it evident that the story needed to start in a different place. The story was a very long time in the writing, so it had time to percolate.
Brass Castle–That’s what often happens to me. Stuff in chapter one usually migrates somewhere else. That’s why I tell people to keep and “outtakes” folder.
Yeah!! I found you….again!!! Somehow I was missing your blog posts and always enjoyed the read and information….and today was no exception…
Yes, sharing! Yum, pierogies…married Polish, but Ukraine in the background! Waffling if my first chapter is my first chapter…and so on…so glad to be on the follow list again.
Judy–Welcome back! Sorry that MailChimp lost you. Unfortunately, a lot of people stopped getting notices when I was in the hospital last summer. Most subscribers were restored by our intrepid webmaster, Barb Drozdowich, but some of you fell through the cracks. If you don’t get a notice next Sunday, try re-subscribing.
As I say, first chapters have a way of migrating. I’m sure it will find a home. 🙂
This post had me chuckling… and cringing. I started my second novel with the weather AND a group scene! Many drafts later and the published version was completely different. Since then, I start each first draft with the words, written in capital letters at the top of the page, ‘Ditch the Rules, Write Freely’ ???? I find it fascinating how different the (supposedly ????) finished novel is when compared to the first few drafts.
Joy–I love your motto! Every writer should have that on the wall. So true that books morph and turn themselves around many times before they’re actually ready for the marketplace.
Ah, but you missed the one that I personally hate most of all: the bored hero. A character who has epic knife skills or is otherwise interesting, but who is going, “I’m the best and life holds no more challenge. I am so bored of everything that the reader might actually find cool about this story.”
Nothing will make me throw a book across a room faster than a bored character.
Kessie–I didn’t know that one was so common. I feel the same way about bored heroes. In fact, the last book I abandoned and deleted from the Kindle had that opener. Mystery trying to be noir described this tedious, self-involved man for pages. Then he went to a bar and met another tedious, bored narcissist. No hint of a plot in three chapters. Delete time. I thought it was just me. I guess I mostly read books with women protagonists. They can be boring, but usually not bored. 🙂
Hi Anne, I actually started my contemporary YA with the DREADED wake-up cliche’ … I had NO IDEA it was the worst. I have revised this opening countless times over the past ten years. I change it… query it to agents, get a few bites for full requests, and then, they pass. Sigh. Not one has ever told me why and I am talking at least fifteen agents. I obviously have something, but could it be the opening is what turns them off? Wouldn’t that happen more at the query’s begging? I am interested what you have to say. Thank you so much for posting this…food for thought.
Michael–I didn’t say the Alarm Clock is the worst opener. Just the most common. It sounds as if you write a good query. So yeah. Maybe you might think of changing that opener. Try lopping it off and see what happens. You could also start the night before.
Thanks for the suggestion, Anne. I appreciate it!
One of these days, i really want to write a story that opens with an alarm going off and the MC waking up–next to a corpse. But I bet that’s been done to death (see what I did there?) too.
Janet–I just read a mystery that opened with that scene. Definitely not a sleepy opener, but yeah, it’s been done.
Oooh, great great post! I’m very happy to figure that I don’t do most of these 11 things, BUT, admittedly, I believe I am prone to musing. Well, I know about it so I’ll keep an eye on it (or two, lol)… Thanks so much for the reminder.
Also, I’m so glad you don’t say that opening inside a confessional booth has been overdone, phew! 🙂
So, you are saying, “It was a dark and stormy night” is not a grabber? ???? Or, as in the movie, Throw Momma from the Train, the variation, “The night was moist.”
Leon–Throw Mama from the Train is one of the great film classics! It should be quoted at all available opportunities. 🙂
Ya, the mirror scene.
I have read that one many times and, done well, I admire it. Not done well and I often gloss over it.
Love that you have expanded out a list of commonly used novel openers and cliches to help promote deeper search for diversity!
Jaya–I think there may be fads for clichés. A while ago I started binge-reading Regencies and every single one seemed to start with the mirror scene. But I don’t see it as often now. But opening in a crowd scene seems to be very trendy That’s the one where you have no idea where you are or what is going on or who to root for because there are too many characters. And of course we can hope that one of our innovative openings will become a cliché one day. After all, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. 🙂