First Lines
Greetings and Salutations Scribblers!
How many of us pick up a book at the store and read the first line to decide if we’re going to buy it? I have been guilty of this.
And while the first line isn’t always a good barometer of whether or not a book is actually to your tastes or if you’ll enjoy it, it still holds a lot of weight. Before it ever makes it onto a book store shelf, it’s got to snag an agent and an editor’s attention. It needs to hook them and make them curious enough to keep going.
This is why so much emphasis is put on the first line–and eventually the first 250 words of your manuscript. It’s got a lot riding on it being magnificent and eye-catching. In today’s video, I want to chat about what a killer first line looks at and examine some methods you can use to create your own that will nudge your readers to keep going.
First lines are the invitation to the reader to join you on a journey. It’s your chance to establish your character’s unique voice, hint at conflict and tension, or establish the baseline for a character. Regardless of which you’re aiming for–or if you can manage to wrangle all of those into one sentence!--it needs to make the reader curious.
There are a few ways you can do this.
Create a unique voice
Provide a statement of simple fact
Give a fact or idea and immediately state the opposite
Immediately set the mood/tone of the story
As an added bonus, the more you can incorporate these tactics into one stellar sentence, the more likely you are to hook more readers. Because in the end, we all have different tastes in reading and a first line that someone thinks is fantastic might be a line that another person doesn’t care for. It’s all subjective.
Let’s look at some examples and breakdown how it’s hooking the reader.
Example one is from Hold Me Closer, Necromancer by Lish McBride:
“I stood in front of today’s schedule still holding my skateboard, still drenched from my ride over, and still desperately wishing I hadn’t dropped out of college.”
The voice of this character is fantastic. There’s frustration, cynicism, and regret layered into the subtext. Businesses with weekly schedules rarely pay well enough to make a living from. The fact they travel by skateboard tells you they might not own a car, so finances are a concern. They’re drenched–no one wants to show up for work drenched. And we get that final little twist of them wishing they hadn’t dropped out of college. The tension and conflict is baked into this voice and it leaves the reader wanting to know why they dropped out of college and what in their life has led them to having this miserable day.
McBride has created a unique voice, stated some obvious facts, and immediately set the tone of the story
Example two is from Reckless by Cornelia Funke
“The night breathed through the apartment like a dark animal.”
This is a short, simple line but it’s doing so much work to set the mood and tone. It immediately brings a sense of tension and fear to the reader. The night is dangerous, it can’t be trusted. What makes it unable to be trusted? What makes it feel like a dark animal stalking its prey? This opening line nails the mood and tone of the novel and uses that to draw the reader in.
Example three is from The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
“When I wake up, the other side of my bed is cold”
This simple statement of fact is beautiful. It establishes the mood–waking up and finding the other side of bed, where someone should be, cold hints at the tension, disappointment, and driving force behind Katniss’s journey in the book. I like this line as an example because at it’s surface, the first time you read it, it doesn’t feel overly significant, but when you finish the novel and come back to it, your understanding of it completely shifts and you realize that from page one, you were being set up for Katniss’s love of her sister and shown the very thing that is driving every single choice she makes. On that first read, it does create questions and conflict–who is missing? Why? The reader will want to go on to learn these answers.
Example four from The Martian by Andy Weir:
“I’m pretty much fucked”
This one immediately grabs the reader with its simplicity. It’s immediate character insight, it sets the tone as hopeless and cynical. And it leaves you with a lot of questions. Why are they f-ed? What happened? Is there really no possible solution?
Each of these uses a different tactic and most combine several elements. Consider which ones hooked you and which didn’t, then examine why. Doing this will help you to better understand your own writing and lead you to writing a first line that not only fits your novel, but grabs the reader’s attention and doesn’t let go. Then grab a stack of your favorite books and start reading those first lines. Consider what it’s establishing for the novel and what questions it raises for the reader. Finally, look at your own first line and see how you can incorporate more into it to hook the reader and make it unforgettable.
I’d love to know what your favorite first lines are! Drop them in the comments and let us know what hooked you!
Until next time, happy writing scribblers!
As always, your mileage may vary! If you have any tips for recognizing burnout before it takes over completely, please drop those in the comments below.
Consisting of five sections, this course will include strategies for revising characters, plot, pacing, and worlding building. It also includes resources for copyediting and for gaining insight into your manuscripts theme and purpose
