STORY OPENING

STORY OPENING

What Should a Story Opening Do?

It should grab your attention

It should leave you with questions

It should make you want to keep reading

This is called “hooking the reader.

Writing a story opening:

The objective is to make the reader want to keep reading

 

Make it dramatic, informative or exciting using at least one of the 6 components mentioned above.

·        Describing a character

·        Describing a setting

·        Start with an action

·        Start with some dialogue

Character Description

You could introduce a character (or more than one)? Tell the audience about character, their name, something about them that is relevant to the story.

You could tell us about their past, something interesting that will be impact on what happens? Or something that will explain why something will happen?

If you are writing about WW2 it could be about their experience of the war, how it has affected their family

Example of Character description

Felix, the dragon, was mighty, fearless and cruel as he would often travel to nearby towns to kidnap children to keep as his servants. He had big black wings, and green skin which was scaly and filthy.

Felix’s face could scare the bravest man, and his nose could breathe out fire and poisonous gas.

Clumsily, he would fly around wondering, “Which town will I torture today?”

Setting Description

Here you give the reader information about the setting such as -

Where and when is the story set? What time of year (or season)

What can you see, hear, smell or touch?

What would the audience or the reader see if they were standing there?

Example 1 - Setting Description.

Calmly, white snowflakes sprinkled down onto the ice capped mountains. The area was deserted, and there was a small field in between two mountains where wild winter flowers grew.

The flowers were not like ordinary flowers, they looked like bright, colorful and velvety hands stretching out of the fresh snow.

Although it seemed peaceful there, there was a hidden cave amongst these mountains where a hideous dragon lived.

Example 2 - Setting Description

Grandma's attic was long and gloomy and filled with mixed-up shapes and threatening angles. Light seeped in from three grimy skylights and the air swam with dust. Fresh rain tapped its fingertips on the roof and wind whipped through the trees outside.

Cole felt very far away from everyone, as if the world and everything in it were trapped within the attic itself. He stuffed Grandma Jenny’s keys into his pocket and fumbled around the doorway until he found an old-fashioned light switch on a chain. 

Dialogue

Could you show us a conversation that a character may have that tells us a little about what might happen? Or something that suggests a possible storyline, or leaves the reader with a question?

“But Mum, I don’t want to stay at Grandma’s! She has weird things in her house and it is really spooky. It almost feels like the paintings are watching me…”

Open Ended

Write at least four ways by which a story can start or open.