Great article on "hooking" readers

[Kali]

I bought The Writer today (the July 2011 edition) and there was a great article in there I wanted to share and/or talk about.  It's called "Don't Start Your Story With a Strong Hook" by Nick Mamatas, and it's about how writers often *try* to start with a hook, but do it badly or fail altogether.

One part in particular caught my eye:

"Rather than correcting the error of a boring beginning by eliminating the boring beginning or by changing the story's structure so that it is interesting from beginning to end, they simply added some action up top."

Mamatas uses the examples of starting with "...gunfights, monsters, characters cursing (four-letter words are very common story openings these days)..."

I was irresistibly reminded of a lot of the stories I'd read as part of Critters.  In one week, I read six stories all that started with fights that had nothing to do with the rest of the story.  You could eliminate the fights entirely, cut pages from the manuscript, and not have lost a thing except paragraph after paragraph that boils down to "The main character is a bad-ass."

Do you think new writers are trying too hard to find a hook, with the result that they're just gimmicks and not an integral part of the story?  Jim does it right, I think.  Even "The building was on fire, and it wasn't my fault" *was* an integral part of the story because it's basically the end of a short story about how he got Mouse.  It wasn't just a great first line or a great hook, it had a story to tell in itself and one that had a major impact on the rest of the series.

[Shecky]

In medias res is a difficult but very rewarding tactic for beginning a story - if you pull it off, you look like a genius, but if you don't, you look like a schlub. Very little middle ground there.

[Starbeam]

I'll have to see if Barnes and Noble has this.  But I would say this is something that happens often, and I've seen lots of agents comment on similar.  Sort of that it seems like beginners work very strongly on the beginning to get that hook to grab people, but then the effort just drops off. 

I do agree; Jim does it right.  He starts off with the hook, continues it, and it just keeps going and building.  Shecky's right, too.  It can be a bitch to get done right.  But when someone does, it can be extremely memorable.

[LizW65]

I've noticed this kind of "cold opener" mostly on TV shows--specifically, formulaic police procedural type programs.  The show will open with someone being murdered, the credits roll, and the next scene is the regular cast investigating the crime.  It's become kind of a cliche by now, but when done well (i.e. Castle) it can also be very entertaining.

[Snowleopard]

What is that opening line from the Moon is a Harsh Mistress.
"The door irised open."  Simple but you know you're not in a normal environment.

[arianne]

So many of those stories that open with action (fight scene, car chase etc) are just setting the stage for a series of flashbacks that led up to the action event. Like, okay, ch 1: random guy is trying to kill me. ch2: twenty years ago. ch3: ten years ago.....ch 50: thirty seconds ago.

Generally speaking, I don't like that kind of plot very much (like writing a murder back to front... ) although I see quite a few authors using it. I'm not sure whether or not it's to hook the reader or whatever but most of the time it doesn't work so well.

That said, I do feel an urge to start a story with something exciting and crazy just because it sounds like something really cool to do....(I know, I know, hypocrite, thy name is Arianne... )

So, um, any tips?

[Figging Mint]

It's become kind of a cliche by now,

So cliched that I don't even read them.

TBH,  I even skipped over "The building was burning, and it wasn't my fault".

The popcorn-devouring public has already been well trained into expecting things like this; I expect there is more to the article than you could post here or it would just be a sad reaffirmation of longstanding knowledge.   

[Snowleopard]

Of course it might be fun to do a whiz bang action opening and then have the main character thinking - "I wish it was that exciting and proceed to the real and verrrrry boring time he or she actually had."

[the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh]

Of course it might be fun to do a whiz bang action opening and then have the main character thinking - "I wish it was that exciting and proceed to the real and verrrrry boring time he or she actually had."

There's a Season 2 NewWho episode that comes pretty close to that.

[OZ]

I think writer Harlan Coben is one of the best that I have read at inserting a hook at the beginning of his book that actually is an integral part of the story. It's not always the first sentence but it's usually in the first chapter. I enjoy it when it's well done but can't stand it when it's clunky.