posted
wbriggs, thanks for your kind offer to read ch 1 of Inferno. Only problem, I can't email it to you (the email address isn't working). For anyone else, I rejigged the opening, if anybody would like to have a read and maybe see how you feel about reading a longer version:
'Danny woke in a room that looked familiar but wasn’t. It was dim, the only light through heavy orange drapes. There were three other beds, all empty except one in the far corner near the window, which had a pale grey curtain pulled around. It was a hospital. He lay in silence and listened until his ears rang. There were no sounds outside his pulse and breathing, no voices or clanging meal trays. The air was chill and weighty as a fridge. Fine clear tubing snaked across the sheets. As he watched, a loop began to slide off the bed. He thought it was gravity, but the tubing went taut. Then it snagged the back of his wrist. ‘Hey,’ he said. ‘Stop that.’ The needle in his hand was hurting. But when he leaned down, there was no-one by the bed.
posted
Okay, intriging. I would read on to cast my judgement.
Two things;
It was dim, the only light through heavy orange curtains. Maybe: It was dim, the only light muffled by heavy orange curtains. Or: It was dim, the only light cast through a split between two heavy orange curtains.
posted
Thanks for the comments and for reading. I kind of liked 'chill' but if it's jarring... The suggestion for reworking the light through curtains is nice. v. helpful!
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posted
I'm afraid I can't get past the "he woke up" beginning. It must be the most cliche'd cliche of openings. After you've hung out here and read submissions to F&F for a couple of years, you'll see what I mean. That particular opening drives agents crazy, too. Not everyone minds it as much as I do, but you'll find the lack of originality to the opener starts you out immediately in the minus column.
My suggestion... start somewhere else. Why does he have to be just awakening. Have your opener start with him being suspicious of a medical treatment, or with lunch, or with ANYTHING but waking up.
posted
'He lay in silence and listened until his ears rang.'
I have to say I love that line, but I don't know if I would read further. I hate hospitals and I'm not interested in reading a story that starts there. But take it with a grain of salt, because it's just my personal opinion
posted
Thanks Elan. I've only just joined here so haven't read too many (also two books I liked did it well: Patrice Chaplin's Siesta, though that's not in a hospital but an airport runway; and Other People, an old and slightly less provocative one by Martin Amis). I'm taking the comments seriously on that. Unfortunately the whole premise of the novel involves the main character wondering if he's in hell, and if he is, what that means. So it has to begin with a jarring awakening. It's so useful to know that agents hate it too, though. You're all being enormously kind by even reading, if it's that cliched. So thanks for being honest! I'll come up with something different. Posts: 0 | Registered: Feb 2008
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posted
If it makes you feel any better, I originally started my own WIP out with the character waking up, not knowing where she was or who was around her. Like you, I felt chagrin at realizing what a trite opener that was.
I've experimented with a variety of openers and what I've discovered are that there are a multitude of ways to show your character's distress without resorting to "he woke up." One of the reasons starting with a waking up scene is frowned upon is because it's dull. Because we don't know the character in the opener, we don't care that they are confused and frustrated. We want ACTION, something to engage our interest and draw us into the story.
In my case, I've rewritten the opener a couple of times, experimenting with the POV of others surrounding her. I'm currently working on yet another revision, one that details an event crucial to the story that I had only previously hinted at. My main character isn't even IN this prologue. Once I released my attachment to the idea that my character waking up was the starting point, I discovered a far better starting place, one with lots of action and tension.
My suggestion is: Save your waking up draft, but experiment with other versions and other POVs for your opener. Then, once you've explored other alternatives, you can make a decision based on choices and what's truly best for your story.
posted
The waking up opening seems to come naturally because in a sense, it is a natural starting point in our everyday lives. We wake up to the day, we wake up after naps, important phone calls wake us up. Putting this into the story also lets us cheat a little because we can avoid having to show the action leading up to a significant event. But perhaps there are other ways your character could "wake up"? He could be involved in some activity, or going through some medical test, fully aware, and then he "wakes up" to the realization that something might be wrong. He's fully conscious, but a part of his mind kicks into gear and he begins to question everything from a new perspective. Just a thought.
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posted
Despite the hatred of "wake up" openings sometimes it it the right place to start for your story. If that's the case, you need to make the 13 something really special to get over the "cliche" groan.
I don't know that you need the first line. You are telling us what the rest of the paragraph does a better job of showing us. Also, you don't have to tell us he's in a hospital, we'll figure it out from the rest of the descriptions.
You might want to pick up with the "He lay in silence and listened until his ears rang."
It's a great line and snagged my attention but right now it's buried in a ho-hum opening.
The "hooks" for me were the line I already pointed out and the tubing moving as if by itself. Show me what's happening from there and kill most of the description.
So, maybe something like:
Danny lay in silence and listened until his ears rang. All he heard was the sound of his pulse, a bit too rapid, and breathing, a bit too shallow. The air was chill and weighty as a fridge. It was dim, the only light muffled by heavy orange curtains
Fine clear tubing snaked across the hospital sheets. As he watched, a loop began to slide off the bed. He reached out to stop its fall when the tubing went taut. Then it snagged the back of his wrist yanking the needle in his vein.
‘Hey,’ he said. ‘Stop that.’
But when he leaned down, there was no-one by the bed.
***
Now he's not necessarily waking up. He's alone in a hospital room and something weird is happening with his IV.
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