posted
I am doing a rewrite, again, to the beginning of Blood Vows, which takes place after the others I have written. How do I write the beginning simply enough, with enough explanation for each introduction of characters and how do you talk about people in the beginning of a story without adding too many characters? Help, please.
Posts: 341 | Registered: Jan 2006
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posted
Find a place where only one or two characters are present and do not worry about the back story, just the story ahead.
There are hundreds of details that you know about the characters and you might think many of them are important.
The only important things we need to know are the ones relevant to that particular story.
Once the original characters are introduced, then add another character or two. If you are writing a short story do not use more characters than you absolutely need. And do not fully introduce minor characters who are more of an extension of another character's role/power.
Always keep focused on what the MC knows and this will help you keep your story simple.
If your story requires a complex set up to establish the motivations and the plot goals, then you are starting too late, move back a scene to when the immediate goal was simple.
If you are writing a serial, where the sequel/prequel relationship is important, then you cannot hope to reestablish the same characters each story with all of their traits, you only need to introduce them with the traits relevant to the current chapter.
Do not dwell on introductions, move into the action and keep the plot moving. If you know your characters, the way they act will impart their character to us.
posted
Then I don't understand anything that I am gathering from this site. First I'm told don't start here, start further back. then I try to start further back and that isn't right either.
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posted
I haven't read your stories either. It's entirely possible that both "here" and "further back" are the wrong place to start this story.
Have you finished the story yet? Often you need to write the whole thing before you understand it well enough to know how to begin it. If you havne't finished - don't worry about the beginning. Just press on.
One incredibly useful tool is POV - if you choose a deep POV, that automatically limits and simplifies for you, because you are restricted to telling us what your character percieves. That makes it easier to resist the temptation to try to explain everything all at once.
posted
What you need to ask yourself is this: what makes the beginning complicated? Is it the relationship between two characters? Profound philosophical musings? Advanced scientific theory? Any and all of these are (potentially) complex issues, and may require varying levels of expositional detail to fully deliver their importance in the story to the reader.
That brings up another thing...is it important that the readers know every little complicated detail? Or can you get away with feeding them a little bit at a time, just as we tend to absorb information in real life. This can also generate successive 'hooks' throughout a story...if the exposition is well crafted.
So, basically:
1.) Decide what elements of the introductory section of your story are complex.
2.) Decide which of these elements the reader must know to understand events or motivations in the story, and the order in which said elements need to be introduced (for clarity's sake).
3.) Less is (generally) more. At first, anyway...unless you are writing obviously 'hard' SF that has been advertised as such. If you keep things relatively simple, but not mundanely so, the reader is able to comprehend what's going on and why without being inundated by a tide of information.
Actually, let's not use the word 'simple'...'clear' might be more appropriate in this case. Clarity, with the right proportions of information, will lead to a balanced beginning. The best way to accomplish this is to write a beginning, filtering in your exposition as you see fit (perhaps loosely basing such a decision on the 3 tips above). Then have someone you trust (and, preferably, someone who is familiar with the genre of your story) read over it and check the 'flow' of the piece. Ask them if they've been told too much, or too little...and if the delivery was too fast/slow in either case.
Until you really get a feel for how much you absolutely need to tell the reader, it is somewhat hit or miss. But that, in my opinion, is the best way to work through the problem.
Note: this is how I do it; the process may not work as well for others.
Inkwell ------------------ "The difference between a writer and someone who says they want to write is merely the width of a postage stamp." -Anonymous
[This message has been edited by Inkwell (edited January 31, 2006).]
posted
I recall the notion that one should always start a story as late in the action as one possibly can. Anything important that goes missing could be shoehorned into the story in a flashback.
I once wrote a novel where I threw out the first eighteen chapters or so. Some chapters got dumped from changing conceptions of the story. I did wedge five or six chapters in later after drastic rewrites and changes of dramatis personae. (Not that the end result could have been very satisfying---I could never get past the rejection-of the-first-three-chapters-and-outline stage.)
posted
Examine your story to discover the main dramatic conflict. The moment when that conflict becomes apparent to the protagonist (or POV character, if the two are different) should occur in about the first 2--5% of your text.
You pick out one main protagonist, one main dramatic conflict, and use the moment they come together as your opening. Do that, and making it simple is a piece of cake.
posted
Decide what the reader absolutely has to know to start the story. If you have more than 2-3 things, you'll have to cut, and present the information later to the reader.
Use one to two characters (with respect to the opening of your short story: you can use the aunt and the main character, but the mother is one complication too many). Keep it simple. The reader does not know everything you do, and has to work it out gradually. Don't be afraid to provide clear explanations in the first paragraph or so.
Other than that...I'll freely admit my beginnings tend to suck. So I may not be the best person to offer advice.
posted
You don't necessarily have to write it in order. Sometimes just writing out the rest of the story will change things anyway, as characters and plot lines develop. Take the advice you've seen so far and put it on the back burner while you write the rest. When you have a good feel for the flow and shape of your story, you'll probably be able to start it in the right place.
Also, when I've gotten stuck, I've talked to friends and family about where I want the story to go, and where it is now. Just sounding out various ideas, even if they aren't completely useful, can put things into perspective. Of course each person has their own ideas about how things should be done, but I use their ideas as a springboard listening more to their thought process and logic flow than their actual words.
posted
Another tidbit of advice to add to the pile:
You don't need to explain everything right away. Start with a regular scene, and slowly show us (show, don't tell) through dialog and thought, whatever backstory we need. Only show us what we NEED to know. Let the readers discover things for themselves through your characters actions. Feed us tidbits of backstory once in a while in other scenes. It doesn't all need to come out at once. Just give us enough to get hooked, and then show us the rest later.
quote:One incredibly useful tool is POV - if you choose a deep POV, that automatically limits and simplifies for you, because you are restricted to telling us what your character perceives. That makes it easier to resist the temptation to try to explain everything all at once.
Super Ditto. This is a wonderful tool for simplification.
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