McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft

Where do you start?

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Suilan:

--- Quote --- He drove there in a self-propelled mechanical device called a car, which ran on fossil hydrocarbons extracted from underground deposits; in the United States of America this had been a popular means of transport for about a century."
--- End quote ---

I don't see how this is a problem specifically of the beginning. In Fantasy and SciFi, exposition is always a tricky thing. I also don't see "start with hook" and "start (first chapter) at point of threatening change for main character" contradict each other. Hook only refers to the first few paragraphs anyway.

In your Shadow Avatar example, you might start with something that needs less exposition, but happens on the same day. That day might have been a bad day right from the beginning. Several bad things happen that the reader will recognize as bad things even without the background knowledge. OK, he is woken early by his Intercom beeping. He receives a bad message from the Instellar Trade Board concerning the meeting scheduled for this noon. He gets angry. Curses. Calls them backward-sighted conservatives who think that any idea that was younger than 400 years was dangerous and likely to lead to chaos and rebellion. The character has another message from his brother-in-law, saying that he hasn't seen his wife in a week.

The meeting with the Interstellar Trade Board won't come until the second chapter, but it is that day in the first chapter that marks the turning point for the character from "normal life" to "life-threatening adventure."

P.S. That gives you plenty of time in the first chapter to sneak in some of the necessary exposition.

Suilan:
BTW, by "moment" I don't mean "the one second when everything changes." It can be a day or even a week. In my own trilogy, I start with the second-last day of the journey to the character's new home, NOT with the arrival. One reason was that the reader needs to see more of the country and fantasy world, because the following 20 or so chapters are set at one rather secluded place.

BUT all the anxiety and insecurity the character feels about leaving the old home and starting new some place where she doesn't know anyone is already present right from the beginning. When she arrives, she has already made a decision about what she needs to do first and most importantly at her new home.

blgarver:

--- Quote from: neurovore on December 18, 2007, 05:14:13 PM ---How do you pick where in the story is the first scene, then ?  How do you pick the dividing point between story and backstory ?

--- End quote ---

Honestly, I think the scene chooses me.  I don't outline or overplan...which has its definate cons, but it's just the way I work...and when I start typing, my words are driven by the story concept I have settled on.  Almost always the concept evolves by about page 30 and it's going in a completely different direction than what I had in mind at first.

I write pretty organically, so I can't really say with any certainty how I decide what comes first.  That's why I write linearly...I can't write later scenes until I know what has happened in the early scenes.  My stories are always evolving this way.  And then I write the backstory scenes to explain stuff in the story's present when I need it.

I realize it's a kind of sloppy approach, but it's just the way it happens when I start writing.  It feels natural to me, so I figure I shouldn't fight it.

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