Where would you say your story begins?

[HourglassMemory]

I'm not expecting answers like "on the 1st page" and such.:tongue
I want you to tell us the pivotal moment you think your story really begins.
WHERE it happens.
Sure there's stuff happening before the BIG thing happens, but where do you think your story would start being the story you always wanted to put on paper?
I understand that you could think "Well, where my story begins, it's where my book begins! Why would I write stuff that didn't matter?"
But that's not really what I'm asking.

On my main WIP, what you see throughout the book is influenced by a single lecture given by my MC. Were it not for that lecture, nothing afterwards would happen.
I made this moment my prologue, because in the 1st chapter I begin about 3 days after that lecture, and in all chapters, you see the inevitable effect of that lecture on what happens.

Of course if my story became famous it would be famous for what happened 10th chapters later until the end.
But it all has to begin somewhere, and my story began with a lecture.
Where would you say yours began?
In a park? a plane? A ship? A forest? Castle? Living room watching tv?
What did a character do that started it all?
The place and time! that's what I want to know.

[Maprilynne]

Wow, I know this isn't the answer you wanted, but the event that sets the entire book into motion happens in my first two pages.

[Melanie Nilles]

I cut out 10,000 words of my short, making it shorter, because I realized the story I wanted didn't begin at the beginning I thought I wanted. Rather, the part I liked began later. Now it's tighter and shorter, hopefully it will stay short enough to submit to WotF.

[JoNightshade]

Interesting question. And in thinking about it, I have an interesting answer.

Actually my book begins with the death of my MCs mother. This is not so interesting except for the fact that this happens years before the opening of my story and I am only planning on mentioning it once in the entire book. But my MC is the person she is because she is responsible for the death of her mother. She abandons her own life, becomes completely closed, and focuses her existence on supporting her father. She probably would have done those things anyway, to some degree, but her mother's death was the moment that really solidified who she is. The book itself is her coming out of her hole and finally living her own life.

In my finished novel... the beginning is... hm. I think it's when my MC finally decides to venture out of his shell and ends up meeting someone at a cafe. That's really the point at which he begins to change and grow.

[JohnDavidPaxton]

First book begins at the start of chapter two when the main character is dragged into a situation he doesn't comprehend.

[HourglassMemory]

Wow, I know this isn't the answer you wanted, but the event that sets the entire book into motion happens in my first two pages.
Lol where does ti happen?
there's no need fo rdetails.
I was just curious what were the places where big stories start.

[Joe Moore]

Most agents and editors will tell you that the biggest mistake many writers make is starting their story in the wrong place. Here are a couple of thoughts to consider. Start your story at the moment your main character's life is jolted out of the norm into chaos. Whether it's mental, physical or spiritual, begin at the moment of "impact". And also keep in mind Kurt Vonnegut's rules of writing, particularly #5 which is to start your story as close to the end as possible. Here's a post I wrote last May on the subject over at InkSpot (http://midnightwriters.blogspot.com/2007/05/start-at-end.html). Good luck.

[GeorgieB]

WIP #1 begins when my MC returns from a canoe camping trip and finds that he has a new neighbor who is female, attractive, and single. But the story doesn't really start until chapter 2 1/2 when he discovers that she is also his new boss. Throw in a nasty company and a less-than-nice CEO and off we go.

WIP #2 begins when my MC discovers tow bodies in a snow drift. Happens also in chapter 2.

WIP #3 (NaNo tripe) is a re-telling of a fairy tale (Snow White) from a risque point of view, and starts right there on line 1, chapter 1 with "Once upon a time..."

I also have another work that's being edited that starts immediately when he discusses a problem with a couple of gym attendents. The crux of the story happens later but laying out the problem in chapter 1, scene 2 seemed to be the right way to start the story.

[Danger Jane]

It really DOES start on the first page. The two MCs, a mother and daughter, meet each other for the first time on the first page. It's a big moment. Happens on the mother's private island on the Aegean.

[KTC]

My story starts with the first sentence. It is probably the most important sentence in the story as far as I'm concerned. I concentrate a lot of effort on that first sentence BECAUSE I want the story to start with that sentence. It is the way it has to be.


ETA: The story I am thinking about at the moment is called SUMMER ON FIRE. It is the story of 3 boys who burn a barn down...and from the barn fire there is a series of escalating events...house fire...murder...weeks long cover up of the murder...etc, etc, etc. The fire starts in the first sentence...therefore, so does my story.

[Sean D. Schaffer]

In my present novel WIP, the story hasn't really begun yet, and I've finished Chapter 3 just today (My NaNoWriMo piece). It will probably begin a few chapters beyond where I'm at right now, but since I'm winging this piece, I really do not have an idea at present where exactly the story will begin.

[Toothpaste]

Well for Alex it's pretty easy as I have a line at the very end of the third chapter that reads: "I suppose you could say that this is where our story Truly Begins."

Not that the three chapters before it weren't necessary. But to be honest, I like a bit of set up and backstory (not just as a writer but as a reader). Yes yes not what an agent or editor would say, but well, I'm not an agent or editor!

[CACTUSWENDY]

:D...Mine starts out with the serial killer getting rid of his latest victim. First line, first chapter.
Second chapter is leading into the finding of another dead body. Different killer.
Third chapter is police coming into the story.

Since my MC is a cop and the minor MC is a serial killer I have to weave their two stories through out the book. I also have to weave the 'different killer' into it. Keeps the pace moving right along. (Blood, mayhem, death. The perfect ingredients for a crime book.)

Not sure if that is what you were looking for. But this is how mine sits right now. You are dumped into the storyline from the first and ushered through the whole story with them both, plus another to keep your mind working. :)

Still lots of work to do on making it tighter and cleaning it up, but this lay out is what it will stay at.

[LilliCray]

Mine starts with a trip to Europe. There's only one scene at the moment that takes place *in* Europe, but the events of the story would be totally different if my MC's brother (also an MC) hadn't boarded that plane. Plus it's a good way to illustrate their sibling-y affection. :D

[Khazarkhum]

NaNo: On the battlefield, where FMC is running away.

Finished & ready to query: When FMC finds out she's getting married to an evil man.

[J. R. Tomlin]

My story (the most recent one) starts five minutes before my MC's whole world falls apart.

[sanctuary6284]

Currently, my story starts with my MC and his mother being thrown into a canyon, but this could change since the entire work is still in development.

[Storyteller5]

The novel I am currently revising begins at the mailboxes in their apartment building when her friend finds out about the letters she is getting. I'm pretty certain it starts in the right place.

[Sean D. Schaffer]

I think I've found my novel's starting place. Chapter 4 seems to be where everything starts to change for the MC.

I just finished that chapter, and it looks and feels like the beginning of the story.

:)

[Maprilynne]

Lol where does ti happen?
there's no need fo rdetails.
I was just curious what were the places where big stories start.

It starts on a grass field just off a track (like a running track around a football field.) The key to an intriguing start is not to have it occur in an exciting place, but for the events to have great impact. That can happen anywhere.

[HopelessDreamer]

The true plot doesn't emerge until around Chapter Five, but the story leads up to what happens before that.

[Stew21]

My MC is trying to avoid an ugly break up in Instant Messenger when his mother calls. He hasn't spoken to his family in 18 months. She breaks the ex-communication to tell him that his father dies. And this truly is the start of a chain of events that IS the story. No back story, no lead in. Just Hello, you're in my story now.
first two pages.

[sunna]

Mine starts on page five, with an assassination attempt gone wrong. The first four pages are lead in.

[DeleyanLee]

I want you to tell us the pivotal moment you think your story really begins. WHERE it happens.


Oh so very easy, actually: Jack the Ripper takes his first victim in 1888, and inspires my Hero's lover to commit suicide. Everything cascades from that point and ties back into it.

Without that, there is no story.

[ishtar'sgate]

When my MC gives King Nabonidus the news that a good omen accompanies his return to Babylon after a ten year absence.
Linnea

[Elodie-Caroline]

I began my finished novel at the fourth chapter originally; my male MC was having dinner with his sister and discussing a recluse rock star that was on the news. He hates her. I then had a top ministry man explaining the reasons he wanted my man to look after this woman.
Halfway through the book, I decided that I would show what this woman was going through with her tormentor, rather than having it relayed second hand, so I was showing instead of telling this way too. This made another three chapters come about at the beginning of the book and I am much more satisfied with it; it is down to action from page one this way.


Elodie

[Zelenka]

My fantasy WIP starts when my MC is assigned the first legal case of its kind in centuries. Or at least at the moment it does. Still working on the beginning.

The other WIP's pivotal moment is when my MC has to investigate black magic in a graveyard, and finds some stuff belonging to a Church of Scotland minister who disappeared a while before.

[MichaelSt]

If your story doesn't "Start" until the second, third or forth chapter, you probably need to do some cutting and you might as well do it now. Why prolong the agony of indecision?

Start your narrative at the moment of critical change when your MC's world has come to a sudden standstill. Start with the story in full swing, your MC paddling her canoe madly upstream just twenty yards from the waterfall's precipice.

Start at a point where your reader cannot turn away but must keep turning the pages. Start with a major investment in your MC's wellbeing. Start with flair. Threaten your MC's world. Or so say most of the books in my little library.

Save boring and info-dumping passages for the muddle, don't start your manuscript with them.

Michael, got a hole in my head, in Seattle.

[Varthikes]

Completed work:

Starts on page two/three where the main character encounters the aliens who have just landed on his planet.

Work currently in production:

Starts immediately. It opens with a skirmish where the antagonists are making their move.

[Theognome]

Oddly enough, the 'story' doesn't begin for my WIP until chapter 10 of book 1. This is where the MC comes back to the crack house and begins his ministry.

Theognome

[Wolvel]

My finished work starts page one of chapter one (it has a prologue) when my MC is introduced and thrown into the reason he is there.

My current wip starts in the first chapter with my MC laying there wounded with blood pouring out of a gapping hole in her side. Thinking back as to what brought her to this place.

[L M Ashton]

My FMC's story starts on page one, sentence one, as she's lying in bed with broken ribs and learning that her father has arranged a marriage for her, something which she wants no part of. She then plans her escape.

My MMC's story starts in sentence one of the very next scene as he picks the pocket of a man who ends up dead not five minutes later with him as the prime suspect.

They're both prepubescent. :D I'm mean. *cackles*

[Madison]

When Celine and Ruiz meet on a sultry Caribbean night...about 20 years before page one.

[lfraser]

That's the one question about my WIP I can't answer at the moment. There are several scenes that might be the beginning, but I haven't decided which one, if any, is the best opener. I probably won't know until the draft is finished.

[maestrowork]

Before my novel (The Pacific Between) was bought, I cut out about 15,000 words. I thought the story started there, but it actually didn't -- not the main story, anyway. It had started at a funeral. But it now started at a decision -- that was when the protagonist decided to leap from his ordinary world to accept his call, whatever it was.

As Uncle Jim said, the moment before the character(s) walks through the door and can't go back anymore.

In my WIP, I've decided the story starts with a kill.

[David I]

Ummmmmmmmmm. A big problem. And I'm not sure it has a simple answer.

In multi-POV novels, I'd say that every POV character needs to be well-launched on their own bobsled run by the end of their own chapter. And that each POV chapter needs its own hook and its own launch...

Although I agree with Mr Moore's Vonnegut quote that one should start as close to the end as possible, this rule is hard to apply in certain situations (for example, for those of us who don't know the end when we start.)

The way I interpret this in the case of multi-POV novels is as follows: at the end of their debut chapter, the POV character should be totally embroiled.

(Or entangled. Or entranced. In any case, should have crossed the line into the world of the story.)

[Wraith]

The way I interpret this in the case of multi-POV novels is as follows: at the end of their debut chapter, the POV character should be totally embroiled.
I'll keep this in mind. It's broader than the absolute rules that my favourite novels don't give a damn about and that only manage to scare me. And it seems sensible.

My first wip starts when my character's life changes completely; mad things happen and he goes off into the unknown, so I think both the setting and intrigue are taken care of well enough on that first page. My new wip is something else. I didn't know what the story was and where it began, so I just wrote what came to me, which was a ball at a castle (significant to the plot, but not the most significant, though it makes a pretty good set up), and then switches to my MC on his craziest day (going to work, but not quite making it ;)).

Then again, I'm not a first-page bang girl anyway. :D

[Nakhlasmoke]

My story starts on page 1 with my MC cutting off her hair so that she'll look more like a boy.

My plot starts on page 35 when her best friend falls in love with someone who is not her.

[MelodyO]

My pivotal point is the very first sentence of the book. The second chapter delves a little bit into my MC's normal life, but then it's off to the races for the rest of the book.

[jennlindsey]

Wow, I struggle with where to start ... I always want to begin too early, and too softly, I think.

Right now, I have the distinct feeling my WIP *should* begin on a Trans-Siberian railway train headed east from Moscow, with my two main characters (one Russian, one American) sharing a tiny compartment on the week-long journey in the midst of their troubled marriage, but where on the timeline of the marriage trouble is a point of internal debate -- as well as the exact reason for the trip (I've got several possibilities).

[Sean D. Schaffer]

Believe it or not, I think I may have figured out where my story begins.

Considering The Dragon Princess's main characters are a prince and a female dragon, looking back I'd say it actually does start in Chapter 1. Both characters are presented in that chapter, in one form or another, and the situation which develops when they meet for the first time, begins in Chapter 1.

When I first posted on this thread, I figured it would likely start in Chapter 3 or 4. But the story developed a lot more quickly than I thought it would.

That's one thing I've noticed about winging my novel: it's an unpredictable thing that really is difficult to figure out until you're several chapters into the work -- at least that's the way it works with me.

But as for the topic of this thread, I look at the whole of the work and find the work actually starts with the first chapter.

[MMWyrm]

My WIP (NaNo) starts in the 2nd paragraph when my MC wakes up and realizes a part of his mind that was missing for a long time is back.

Other books.... when an MC finds out her job is changing drastically, when my vampire MC gets the fang modifications that are pivotal to the plot, when an MC stumbled out of the woods and realizes he has failed (which is unusual for him).

Yeah... pretty much where things change drastically for the MC from that moment on.

[Doogs]

Where? On a picturesque terrace in Massilia (modern Marseilles)

When? Three-ish pages in...first section of first chapter

What? My MC learns that Hannibal (the one with the elephants) has moved his army out of Spain and into Gaul. This leads to the deduction that he means to invade Italy, and dictates the rest of the story.

[Selcaby]

Watch a movie - they almost never start with action, but with a shot that introduces the theme or sets the scene. Example: Forrest Gump begins with a feather drifting down from the sky, in rather the same way Forrest's life is blown hither and thither by random forces... Forrest catches the feather. Then he begins telling his life story.

My story begins at 6pm on a Wednesday night in February in an overgrown garden: two strangers meet. This occurs right at the end of chapter one. The rest of the chapter fast-forwards through three months in the life of POV character #1, which may seem a strange way to begin a book, but I'm confident that it's the right approach for me. POV character #1's peculiar lifestyle, and the fact that it's going to change radically once the plot gets going, are at the core of the story.

POV character #2 doesn't even realise anything significant has happened until chapter three. She gets her own intro in chapter two, which is more of a conventional beginning and introduces a subplot or two. By the end of chapter two she thinks she knows what the story she's starring in is going to be about. Then she meets POV character #1 again and realises she's wrong, wrong, wrong (but right too).

[Momento Mori]

My story starts on page 3 with a murder that sets up the central concept of the fantasy element of my WIP and at the same time starts a chain of events that lead to my hero and heroine meeting, which in turns sets them off on an adventure. I'd considered not starting with the murder originally (instead just having references to it), but I came to the conclusion that it was necessary set up in order to plunge readers straight into what was happening.

MichaelSt:
Start your narrative at the moment of critical change when your MC's world has come to a sudden standstill. Start with the story in full swing, your MC paddling her canoe madly upstream just twenty yards from the waterfall's precipice.

Whilst I'm generally in favour of getting straight into the nitty gritty, I'm not sure that it's the best advice for some genres. Sometimes it's important to establish the nuances and world of the character before dropping a H Bomb on it and that can take several chapters. However, if you've got to the middle of your book and nothing's happened, then I'd have to question what the book's about and what the story is.

MM

[Shadow_Ferret]

My story starts with the second paragraph.