Novel Beginnings: How To Start Your Book

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The 15 minutes before the change happens helped a lot. Thanks.

Thanks for the info its been a pleasure listening

I want to write a noval similar to harry potter and percy jackson only a new person named david smoks, how will i do that? And not have it copying the two?

You are gorgeous 😀

I really need help on getting started but finding help without my story getting stolen, I’m afraid. I need helpful guides. 🤞🏼🤞🏼 to my future

Thankyou for this. I’m struggling to start up my next children’s book. I know once the ball is running I will be fine but it’s just that start that annoys me. x

I wrote what I thought was a great beginning, after about 6 chapters, I realize I wrote my obstacle, preclimax and am at the crisis/climax. So now, now I have to help my story find out how we got here. It really expanded where I thought I was going and now what the real issue was. I love how even I’m not only invested but curious about how this happened.

Definitely guilty of information dumping. Thanks for the tips!

An opening seen? Or spending to much time reading post-apocalyptic zombie books?
I woke up today in the middle of a dream. I could only remember this one seen. But I did manage to get it down. What do you think?
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The next morning, I stood there at the big garage door, with the controller in my hand, watching as the trucks and hummers jockeyed into position, ready for departure. Finally I let go and left the control dangling, and signalled one last time for everyone to cut engines and dismount.
As they all finely gathered around, that one last time. I ask them: “Are you all certain you want to do this? If this goes sideways, and you all need to come back, you contaminate this whole base.”
No-one said anything, as they each sheepishly, looked around. No-one wanted to be the first to say it. And no-one wanted to be the first to back out.
Finally I stepped in front of her. And choking back my tears, I ask her: “Stay.”
She didn’t reply. She couldn’t. Instead she fell into my arms crying. “Stay.” I repeated. And then... She was gone.
I watched as she mounted the deuce-and-a-half, and took up the gunner’s position.
I was nearly blind from the tears, as I finally took up the control box again and thumbed the switch.
The big door rumbled up and out of the way.
Outside I could see the sallyport in the fences. And beyond that...
“Please God... You’ve taken everything else. Can’t I at least keep her?”
I watched as the tiny convoy of five rumbled forward...
I stood there for several more seconds, watching. Before I finally pressed the switch... and closed the door.

Excellent tips! I’m trying to write my first book and I have so many starts that violate these no nos 😆

When is the world change best put like for reincarnation or isekai type stories?

One of the easiest ways for me to start a book is to reread or rewatch the first page/10 minutes of a book/show. I then use that to figure out roughly how they start, and go from there.

I wish I could get your help! I took an unusual approach in my first book. It starts with something like an infodump, but not totally dry. It has humor and absurdity and it’s pretty unusual. It’s soon realized that the infodump is a letter he’s writing to send to the past.

The next important bit is that all of the info in this dump is actually untrue. The main character slowly realizes his world was delusional and naive. The story unfolds and contradicts all the info in that letter and it’s pretty important to the purpose of the story. I think it would be bad if I spent multiple chapters building up the false narrative.

I sort of wonder if it’s fine as it is. It seems to be and I’ve never had anyone negatively comment but I also don’t have many readers yet.

I have been trying to figure out how to start my project's first chapter for months– this video had me inspired within the first fifteen minutes.

Thank you ❤

My only blockage I have of not making books as a job to me is: I wanna pay my bills, and 2) English is not my main language. So I just never write to publish but only publish for free and for a hobby.

not a novel but a good game I remember with a bad beginning was ff12, which starts with a scene where the guy you're playing as dies, then has a cutscene where the guy you think is the real main character dies too. Then the main character is pretty much a street rat like Aladin. They could have just started with the actual mc instead of characters I don't care about.

I was originally gonna have my character wake up from a nightmare as the beginning of my story, but I think that maybe it would be better to show the hometown's demonizing of the main character and the corruption that surrounds it. That would actually build to the inciting incident of him being accused of murder rather than showing some traumatizing flashback that won't matter yet. Honestly surprised it took watching a video to realize my original beginning was trash!

so basically every kind of opening is cliche, got it. Man wiriting a book is sooo cliche...

Highly interested in this topic, but video is too long. Should be more succinct, or split into other videos to respect the viewer's time.

My first scene is one step after the inciting incident and the second scene goes back to the inciting incident.

The most annoying thing books ever do is this:

Book 2 of the series: LETS INTRODUCE EVERYTHING YOU WERE TAUGHT IN THE FIRST BOOK ALL OVER AGAIN

But how to start a diet tho? Fat cow

This was really well put, and it really helped a lot!

unpopular opinion i read hunger games in fifth grade and skipped to chapter two 😃

I love all of your videos so much! (: They have helped me become such a better writer!

Only introduce it when it needs to be introduced. If you introduce everything at once, you'll lose the reader or the reader will lose what you're trying to say.

You're not thinking about your entire life with each step you walk. Sometimes, if something happens, it'll bring up memories, that's when you should start introducing things.

For example, I'm writing a... no idea. But this girl is having a fight with her boyfriend because he did drugs. Sure that's bad, but I want my reader to be curious why she's so upset to the point she would've been less mad if he had cheated on her. Then, next chapter, we learn her family was torn apart by her drug-addicted father. That's all I drop. I don't go into other parts of her life because it isn't necessary yet.

My ”book” (its not even one page 💀) starts with the main-character describing the wheater, blah blah explains their fathers dead, gets breakfast and thinks abt their bestie, aka an important character- 💀💀💀


I think I need to make a new start-
But I’ll keep the things I wrote yet to some later chapters 😅😅

Why don't you capitalized your I's? You should practice that before writing.

Quick question, if my story revolves around heros and villains would a fight scene be a good opening? I don't want to throw my readers right into things and overwhelm them, but I think a fight between a villain and the main character would intrigue them.

i keep getting stuck at the first chapter. i write the first five chapters and then think it’s not good enough so i go back, delete and start again. i feel like im starting in the wrong place and like im gonna lose the reader too soon because i should’ve started it different

When I write a novel I take almost years planning it, I have yet to start my newest project but I already have every character fully fleshed out. Every event is planned etc.

It’s really hard to make a hook to capture your readers at the start but also make sure it’s unique and not cliché while also making sure that the hook leads to something bigger.

Lol thought I finally had a good prologue and was gonna restart my story but it starts off with a dream time to scrap that.

I got really excited to see this video after watching your list of what amateurs writers do. Because trying to begin my story is always the most difficult part in writing for me, it's always confusing me in where to begin first because my topic tends to be all over the place since my ideas, topics and thoughts of the story that I'm about to write because I'm still brainstorming so this was really helpful.

So I'm writing this book called Bucket List. It's about this girl in her senior year of highschool and she's dying due to some medical issues. She knows she's dying, so she goes out with all of her friends to complete the 20 items she has on her bucket list. However, none of her friends know that she's dying until she's already dead. I'm not sure if the beginning/end is confusing or not so please give me your opinions.

The beginning starts with the main character in the hospital, dying. She's with her younger brother, her dad, and his girlfriend. She determines she's not ready to die yet and starts to panic. The chapter ends as she dies.

The book ends in the same but opposite way. She's in the hospital, dying, surrounded by her family. She reflects back on her last school year, her relationships, and everything she's done with her life until this point. This time, instead of panicking, she's completely relaxed and she feels that she's ready to go. As opposed to the beginning, she dies peacefully and happily.

If anyone is interested in reading this, I'll tell you where it's posted.

Me reading a book:
Novel: The weather is blah blah blah, waking up, getting ready, cooking food...
Me: Deletes the novel

Me writing a book:
What should the weather be...

Thanks for sharing your experience. I discovered you among several others earlier this week and have watched a few by now. Besides the information and topic choices, your enthusiastic delivery is appropriate with just the right amount of snark.

Btw you shouldnt have books behind books on your bookshelf it will make it too messy

My personal experience is I changed my chapter 4 to chapter 1. It seemed more intriguing than my character waking up in the morning to have the story open up with how the mentor character turns into a fox. I think that was essential information that would get the reader guessing and I think it makes more sense than what I had before. Btw, I’m trying to make my characters fleshed out but I’m not really able to put their dreams and wants into the story very well. Can you make a video about how to flesh out your characters discretely? And maybe a video on writing disabilities?

one strategy I've seen is the authors take a paragraph of an exciting scene (that doesn't spoil anything) and put it before the book even starts (on a separate page from the first chapter) it's actually pretty effective.

Amslrsadmoulanalooknyoubook
100

I strongly agree with not dumping info into the first few chapters. It can get the reader lost and get them thinking about too much at a time that the story gets muddled. It is good to carry the backstory and character feelings or emotions all throughout the book instead of loads of unessisary detail. :D

my begging, is not cliche, but there is something wrong with it. my protagonist Mason is just having a mental break down without context, though touching perfectly on the internal conflict. how might I fix this in revision, so readers understand what's going on, without the point diminishing in value.

53 years old and I am starting the book that I’ve had burning inside of me for the past 30 years. I think I already know what my opening line is going to be.

The Death card hit the table.

I might have to reword that a little bit. But that is the idea

Super helpful as I’m pants-ing my way through my chapter 1!

Me, a 22 year medical student, started my Life's first creative writing with a waking up scene two days ago🧍 I'm dead inside

Thank you. I've watched a lot of your videos and as a young writer they really help me.

When i came in to this video i wanted to learn how can i open a story that has high octane action. She kept saying opening on action doesn't work but you what ? I think i can make it work !