I last wrote on opening lines two months ago, but I recently
joined a FB group called First Line Monday, where we post the opening sentence
or sentences of a book we’re reading or have read. (Or intend to read. No one
checks.) This has proved to be more fun than I expected, and I spend a
leisurely few minutes pulling books from shelves and rereading first lines.
Over the few weeks I’ve been a participant, I’ve become pickier and pickier
about what I’m willing to post. There’s a reason for this.
To my surprise, about four out of five books open with the
weather, either by describing the season or the day or the promise of the week
to come. At the end of this line is a shorter one about someone who’s cranky
despite the sunny weather. The sentences are usually well crafted though not
arresting in style or vocabulary, and they do promise the style of the story to
come.
I’m self-conscious about opening lines right now because I’m
trying to come up with a good opening for my current WIP. I have only 15,000
words left to write but I still have to go back and redo the opening. What I
have doesn’t seem to work; at least it doesn’t feel right.
Generally, I think there are four broad choices for opening
a story. The physical setting (weather, location, time), character description,
character in action, and an incident (arrival of a letter, for example, or a
looming danger). These are broad categories designed to help me focus on
something other than weather, which I didn’t use but seems to pop up no matter
when I’m writing a beginning.
There’s no question that getting the first line right is
important and can be the hardest part of the novel to write. But a good opening
becomes a classic. The American Book Review lists the hundred best opening
lines, including the opening of Moby-Dick,
A Tale of Two Cities, 1984, Slaughterhouse Five, The
Color Purple, and Paradise. To
read the whole list, go here.
Reading these opening lines helps me move past orienting the
reader in physical space, and closer to locating the reader in the
psychological space of the novel. I want her to feel like she has walked up to
a friend or acquaintance and sees what she’s doing, and wonders why. I want the
reader to be in the story, not sitting in a seat in a noisy theater waiting for
the curtain to rise.
Once I have located my character in her life, I’m reading
for inviting the reader in. There are plenty of ways to do this. On her website
Bryn Donovan lists, not first lines, but ways to begin a novel. One suggestion
is the arrival of a letter. Another is a courtroom scene, which is used in Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson.
Donovan lists thirty openings, and gives examples for most of them. You can
find her website here.
In the seventh Mellingham mystery, Come About for Murder, I open with a funeral. “In his last will and
testament, Commodore Charles Jeremiah Winslow, one of the greatest yachting
enthusiasts in the history of Mellingham Yacht Club, asked to be wrapped in a
mainsail and cremated, with his ashes left to sink into Mellingham Bay. His
family argued for six days and six nights over whether or not to comply with
his wishes, but when they understood how much money was riding on this, they
agreed to do as he wanted.”
This is a story about sailing, and the people who live to
be out on the water. And they also clearly have the money to spend as much time
as they want sailing along the east coast. To read more, go here.
Crafting a strong opening for a novel is perhaps the
hardest writing but also the best. A good opening sets the stage for the story
and draws in the reader. We all have our favorite opening lines, and I find
myself returning to them when I’m working on my own.
