When it comes to writing the short story there are two important structural guidelines to remember – the ‘beginning and ending'. Here are six tips for creating a dynamic opening for a short story.
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Six Tips for Creating a Dynamic Opening for a Short Story
2. Six Tips For Creating a Dynamic Opening
for a Story.
A story’s opening paragraph should be designed to
capture a reader’s imagination and inspire them to
read more. It also acts as a pivotal gateway through
which your reader must enter so that they can
journey successfully through your story.
There are many ways of beginning a story: setting,
character description, action, a statement, an idea, or
posing an question.
4. Tip One
● 1. SETTING
Your setting could be a location: a windswept beach, a dark
dystopian city, a magical underwater world, or a simple
hobbit’s hole as described by J. R. R. Tolkien in the
opening page of The Hobbit – “In a hole in the ground
there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with
the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare,
sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or eat: It was a
hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.”
6. Tip Two
● 2. CHARACTER DESCRIPTION
The opening lines can introduce your main protagonist, for
example – “Ella leaned back against the cold damp stone
wall. Her porcelain skin was pale and drawn, with deep
lines etched around her eyes and mouth, and her once
glorious golden hair hung in matted tendrils around her
face.”
8. Tip Three
● 3. ACTION
● Starting your story with strong action is a great choice as it
thrusts the reader into the thick of the story. “The baying
of the hunting dogs drew closer as she dashed through the
thickly wooded forest. Like a mad woman, she fought her
way through the close knit trees, until she was suddenly
redeemed by a burst of bright sunlight as she stumbled out
of the forest into a small clearing.”
10. Tip Four
● 4. A STATEMENT
● The iconic opening statement in Charles Dickens’ A Tale
of Two Cities is dramatic, poetic and memorable, “It was
the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of
wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of
belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of
Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of
hope, it was the winter of our despair, we had everything
before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going
direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way . .
”
12. Tip Five
● 5. AN IDEA
● How about Jane Austen’s opening line in the classic novel,
Pride and Prejudice – “It is a truth universally
acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good
fortune, must be in want of a wife.”
Starting your story with an idea can really get your reader
thinking. Although they may not agree with your idea,
they can be compelled to read on to see where this idea will
take them.
14. Tip Six
● 6. A QUESTION
● “Where’s Papa going with that axe?” said Fern to her
mother as they were setting the table for breakfast.”
Charlotte’s Web, E.B. White.
Beginning your story with a question sets up intrigue in the
reader’s mind. You have provided them with a question
that needs to be answered and they must commit to the
whole story to discover the answer.
15. To explore the creative possibilities for your writing, visit
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