In the Beginning: three elements that create a strong opening sentence

Photo by Jukan Tateisi on Unsplash

In the beginning… there’s only the opening sentence to your story, be it novel, short fiction, or even picture book. Your opening sentence is second only to your closing sentence. And a reader will never get to your closing without being invited in by your opening.

The stakes are high, and it is worth spending time to find the elements that create a story beginning that will cause it to come to life.

It’s important right here, at the outset, to suggest you not get hung up on “the perfect” opener, though. You can begin the work with a placeholder – anything, really – and move on to the second sentence. Like the first chapter in a novel, you may re-write it many times before you are ready to send the story out into the world. You might think of it as the “working” first sentence and move along. Get into the world of your story, and then – with the knowledge you gather from the writing itself – you can return to play with the opening later.