Choosing where to start a story

pandaponies said:

Obviously we all say "start where the story begins, where the action starts" but I understand the urge to want to contextualize and world-build a little bit first and then build up to the initial conflict at the end of the first chapter or something. Sometimes it works (I can think of multiple authors who pull it off GLORIOUSLY [and some who attain enormous success despite not pulling it off at all/terrible openings like ahem a MC fussing with her hair in front of a mirror]), and sometimes it doesn't. What do you guys think? Can this work as long as it isn't boring?

Personally I find I tend to want to:
a) mention the intial conflict
b) 'backtrack' temporally to contextualize
c) build up to the initial conflict usually around the middle of the first chapter

Does that method offend anyone?

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Nope.

Like, "Gerald didn't mean to set the school on fire. It was an honest-to-God accident--cross his heart and hope to die--and it wasn't even really his fault. It all started that morning when Arnold showed up at his house to play basketball like they did every Saturday" blah blah etc. Obviously very simplistic but just a bare bones MG example of the general concept

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That's definitely an attention-grabber - in a good way.

Personally, I think it depends on the kind of story you're trying to tell as well as the execution. In some stories, starting immediately with the conflict can hook the reader, while in others, it can be too sudden of a start. A little bit of setup can either make readers empathize more with the main character, or it can slow things down.

Maybe it's just because I've read a lot of older works, but my stories tend to start gradually, building and gradually setting up the context for the conflict (parts of it, anyway - I have to leave some surprises).

I think about how Treasure Island, for instance, doesn't open with the Hispaniola sailing for the island. Instead, it opens with the mysterious Billy Bones arriving at an out-of-the-way inn, and it's several chapters before we even know there's a treasure to go after. Or The Three Musketeers, opening with d'Artagnan's arrival in Meung and his parents' farewell before a sword is even drawn.

The opening events of both of these books are important to the story and drive the plot forward, but they aren't the main conflict. For better or for worse, I tend to follow that example.

Mr Flibble said:

OFc a great first sentence with a really blah lot of words behind it won't do you no good either...

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Yep. It really matters what sort of company it keeps.

J.S.Fairey said:

I'm probably going to get shouted down for this, but how much do the opening few sentences of the story really matter? Has anyone ever actually put down a book after reading a solitary sentence? Surely, if they've read the blurb and like the concept, unless you can already tell the writing's terrible, the first sentence is no more important than any other?

.

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I've put down so many books after reading a single sentence that even guessing a number would be impossible, but certainly hundreds. And I've probably said no to ten times as many manuscripts because of the first sentence alone.

pandaponies said:

Like, "Gerald didn't mean to set the school on fire. It was an honest-to-God accident--cross his heart and hope to die--and it wasn't even really his fault. It all started that morning when Arnold showed up at his house to play basketball like they did every Saturday" blah blah etc. Obviously very simplistic but just a bare bones MG example of the general concept

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It obviously depends on where it goes from here, but this is a pretty common type of opening, and i have no problem with it at all. I tend to like openings such as this one.

J.S.Fairey said:

I'm probably going to get shouted down for this, but how much do the opening few sentences of the story really matter? Has anyone ever actually put down a book after reading a solitary sentence? Surely, if they've read the blurb and like the concept, unless you can already tell the writing's terrible, the first sentence is no more important than any other?

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I belong to a group that has editors come do first pages. We had one show us how she goes through her slush. You get seconds to keep her attention. Of course, I write for children, and their attention span for a new book can be that small too.

Once you pass the gatekeepers for works for adults, it may not matter as much. However, you still have to get out of someone's slush.

The key is to have a great first sentence that catches the reader and to have every other sentence be so good it keeps him/her.

If you are self publishing, you don't have to worry about the gatekeepers as much.

As said by others, a great first sentence can be lots of things. It can be about action or setting. It can focus on character. Go read the first sentence of each of your favorite books and then find a few books you've never read before. Read the first sentence and no more. Do those sentences work? Why? Which of the books you've never read are you drawn back to?

Decide for yourself whether the first sentence matters and how much.