In Today’s Journal
* How Important Is an Opening?
* One More Blatant Example…
* The Numbers
How Important Is an Opening?
Well, I’m Back Already
I just can’t ignore a chance to teach the obvious. I’ve been at this stuff so long that goofy errors pop right off the page at me. Read on….
As I keep saying, the opening is all-important.
The opening is where you include the hook to your story and then draw the reader deeper into your story through your use of description.
Yesterday, I started to read a story I received via email from a Substack I’m subscribed to.
The tease was interesting. It was basically a pre-story hook, and it worked well. I was absolutely sold and certain I was about to read a great action-adventure story.
Then, in the first two sentences of the story, the writer bought it all back. I closed the Substack, deleted the email that had delivered it to me, and came over here to write this.
Here are the first two sentences of the story:
“Come on, Colt. Please don’t do this.”
I held the man’s arm in my hand and my foot was pressed against his throat.
Just like that, as a reader I was jerked out of the story.
How did the guy on the ground say anything at all when he was lying flat on his back with another man’s foot (probably boot) on his throat and the guy pulling at his arm?
Try it. You might make some ugly gurgling sounds, but you won’t actually say much at all. And you definitely won’t be able to put together two coherent sentences in a row.
The guy on the ground MIGHT’VE said that just BEFORE his assailant took him down and put a boot across his larynx, but not afterward.
Readers WANT to be drawn into your story. They’ve either paid good money for it or subscribed to receive it. What they don’t want is for you to shove them out of the story when they’ve barely opened the door and started reading.
Or any other time.
Again, how the story flows out as you write it is fine (writing into the dark). That’s all up to the characters and whatever happens.
But how the story actually reads after you’ve cycled over it doesn’t go to writing. It goes to presentation. That’s where Craft comes in. How the story’s presented on the page to the reader is up to the writer, not the characters.
One More Blatant Example of Why It’s Better to WITD
If you want to see what NOT writing into the dark can beget—if you want to see a writer who’s in sheer hell—read “Not What I Had Planned”.
I wouldn’t normally post this article even in Of Interest, but it’s such a fine example of what NOT to do, I felt compelled to give you a shot at it.
Cynically, I especially enjoyed the section titled “The Process is going great so far.” Obviously, Dr. Stout’s and my definitions of “great” vary considerably.
To bring it all home, for FIFTEEN MONTHS from May 2024 to present, she was reading critically, revising, rewriting, and adjusting. Folks, that is the very definition of “mired in the myths.” Even now, she’s wondering what her beta readers (critical mind) will think of it.
During that same time period, I wrote and published 23 novels and 62 short stories.
Not because I’m something special—believe me, I’m not. I was able to do that because I kick ego out of the equation and write into the dark. I trust my characters to tell the story that they, not I, are living. No pain, no fuss, just exhilaration and sheer fun. Just sayin’.
As I often add to the end of these posts,
Whatever you believe, unreasoning fear and the myths that outlining, revising, and rewriting will make your work better are lies. They will always slow your progress as a writer or stop you cold. I will never teach the myths on this blog.
Writing fiction should never be something that stresses you out. It should be fun. On this blog I teach Writing Into the Dark and adherence to Heinlein’s Rules. Because of WITD and because I endeavor to follow those Rules I am a prolific professional fiction writer. You can be too.
Of course, as always, you do you.
Talk with you again soon.
The Numbers
The Journal…………………………… 690
Writing of Blackwell Ops 47: Sam Granger | Special Duty
Day 1…… 3250 words. To date…… 3250
Fiction for August..………………….. XXXX
Fiction for 2025………………………. 526647
Nonfiction for August………………… 4510
Nonfiction for 2025…………………… 172910
2025 consumable words…………….. 691943
2025 Novels to Date…………………….. 13
2025 Novellas to Date…………………… 0
2025 Short Stories to Date……………… 31
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………….. 117
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)…………… 10
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)……… 301
Short story collections……………………. 29