How to Start a Story

When writing a story, one of the first things you have to figure out is how and where you want the story to begin. Some stories set up a framing device like a book being read to the audience. Other stories begin with the main character waking up and going through their morning routine. Still more stories start with the protagonist doing some kind of crazy stunt to establish their characterization. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. With billions of stories in existence and thousands of ways to begin one, it can be easy to get locked up from the very first word and not know what to do.

Most English teachers will tell you that when starting a story, you need to basically,

"GRAB YOUR READER BY THE EYEBALLS FROM PAGE ONE AND NEVER LET THEM GO! YOU HAVE TO COMPETE WITH NETFLIX, AMAZON, AND A WHOLE BUNCH OF THE OTHER THINGS FOR THE READER'S ATTENTION SPAN. SO NEVER. LET. THEM. GO!"

The problem here is that that puts way too much pressure on the writer to throw in an explosion or a monster attack every five pages just to keep the readers on their toes. What is this, a Michael Bay movie? Even horror stories don't have the characters under attack all the time. If there's no room to breathe, the story can't be properly processed, and it loses its replay value. This mindset leads a lot of writers to start In Medias Res (in the middle of the story) so they can just cut right to the action as soon as possible. But action and fight scenes are worthless if we're not invested in the characters. Too much action leads people to tune out just as much as too little action. So what is there to do?

Ask 100 people how to start a story, and you'll probably get 100 different answers. But as someone who consumes a lot of media in his life, here are some of the ideas that have stuck with me.

Number 1: If you're going to transition from ordinary to extraordinary, do that as soon as possible.

If the character's going to find a magical creature hiding in their neighborhood, don't spend the first few chapters on their morning routine and work schedule only to introduce something strange on page 50. That's far more interesting than yet another morning montage we've seen hundreds of times. Plant the seeds early. Find fairy dust in the attic, unicorn hair on the front lawn, have that morning routine disrupted by magical hijinks. That way, the character and the audience are equally invested in figuring out what's going on.

Number 2: Do NOT start with an exposition dump.

Yes, exposition is inevitable no matter what kind of story you're writing. But nobody wants to sit down to a book and spend the first two chapters having everything important explained to them so the story can happen. Ideally, you should hook the reader's attention first and THEN explain once they're invested. Or give the exposition gradually as the story happens instead of all at once.

Number 3: Make sure you're starting the plot along with the story

A first chapter has to do a lot. Establish at least one character, establish the story's setting, begin building the overall conflict of the story, and start setting up the lore and worldbuilding. When taking care of all of that, it's easy to get so caught up in the foundation of the story that you forget to start actually telling it. So make sure you include the protagonist's involvement at some point.

Number 4: Make sure what you're covering is relevant to what happens later.

Some people use their first chapter to focus on the setting while others focus on characterization. But while people tend to dislike filler in general, having a filler first chapter is a big no-no. The show RWBY does in its first episode, spending an entire opening narration and introductory action sequence talking about a Macguffin that's mentioned only sporadically throughout the first season and almost completely forgotten about after that. Meanwhile, the real plot of the show doesn't even start until season 3, and even then, the lore was so poorly implemented that they had to make supplementary videos just to include everything. Don't be like that.

Number 5: Relax and have fun

Don't get so worked up in doing everything right that you lock yourself up with perfection paralysis. Write the chapter first and THEN edit it once it's completely finished. It's called the first draft for a reason. It's more important just to get it onto the paper.

Good luck and happy writing.