Your First Line Has One Job
Your first line has one job. Persuade the reader to read the second.
There’s no need to be clever.
No need to introduce your magic system.
No need to set up the plot.
That first sentence just needs to start the reader’s eye moving.
One word of caution: writing speculative fiction makes that one job a touch harder.
You’re asking the reader to step into a world that doesn’t exist. Yet.
Your readers have no map. They don’t know who matters. And they haven’t agreed to come with you.
So your first sentence actually has five mini-jobs.
It must suggest a personality or voice.
It must plant a question in your reader’s mind, or at least suggest a mystery.
It should reassure the reader that the book really is speculative fiction.
It should say there’s instability; things can’t carry on as they are.
And a great first line will add an air of strangeness; it’s that strangeness which attracts readers of speculative fiction.
Signal your genre
Are you writing space opera? Lyrical fantasy? Grimdark or noblebright? Hard SF?
Your vocabulary, your rhythm, and the words you choose should deliver on the promise made by your book’s cover and title.
Could your opening sentence come from any genre? If so, start re-writing.
Give us a voice
Great stories involve characters (and they don’t need to be human). A good first line will show personality. It could be someone’s thinking.
Consider Octavia Butler’s Kindred
“I lost an arm on my last trip home.”
We sense personality there; our narrator has been through so much that missing a limb only deserves a simple sentence. She’s done this trip more than once, so our readers might want to know more.
Plant a question
Readers are often attracted to mysteries.
Can you set up a situation that has them wondering what will happen next?
Get them wanting to know who is speaking, or why they’re angry, or what has just broken.
How about George Orwell’s 1984?
“It was a bright, cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.”
Everything is normal until that last word. The reader sees something has changed; they don’t know what, but the question is planted.
Step into the strange
Conventional fiction can start anywhere. Even a kitchen. But speculative fiction needs to add a dash of the strange.
Your speculative story could start in a kitchen, but you’ll need the special sauce. Is the kettle sentient and in a bad mood? Is the hero a dishwasher on a failing generation ship? Is the cook nervous about working with radioactive ingredients?
Show your reader they’ve picked up the right book.
N. K. Jemisin does this well with her The Fifth Season
“Let’s start with the end of the world, why don’t we? Get it over with and move on to more interesting things.”
Discussing the end of the world is unusual, and what’s this topic they’re going to move on to? Not a normal tea-time discussion. The phrase ‘Get it over with.’ also suggests character.
Go Unstable
Can the situation you’re describing continue peacefully? If so, think about re-writing.
Instability is your friend.
How about Brandon Sanderson’s Mistborn?
“Ash fell from the sky.”
Ash comes from burning, so there’s change. Ash can’t keep on falling, so this situation is unstable. If it wasn’t for the ash, this sentence might be describing weather, but the single word ‘ash’ turns the normal into something possibly apocalyptic.
Something unstable.
What happened? What’s going to happen?
We’re pulled into the story.
Rewrite and see
Me explaining these ideas is one thing. You putting them into action is another.
All bad lines can be improved.
And here’s how.
Let’s start with a bad fantasy example.
“Wendy woke up early, knowing today was the day she would finally begin her mage training.”
You can rewrite this as:
“Wendy had three hours until her master woke. Four spells she wasn’t supposed to know, and one chance to leave the tower before anyone knew she’d gone.”
The first example is what you might scrawl on a calendar. You could swap ‘mage training’ for accountancy, and little would change.
This line tells. There’s no personality. No instability, almost no sense of the strange, or any question for the reader.
The second suggests instability (there’s an urgent need to escape). The genre is flagged with a mention of illegal spells (which also covers strangeness). Will Wendy escape? (There’s the question). And hearing Wendy’s thoughts shows us something of her personality.
The rewrite also gets concrete and specific. (Three hours, four spells, one chance).
A quick test
Try swapping your opening character for an office worker, or someone toiling away in retail, or a modern builder.
Can you make that change without having to rewrite the sentence? If so, think about re-writing.
Three steps toward great first sentences.
- Don’t write one first sentence. Write twenty. Review them the next day, or later, and pick your best one.
- Cut out all explaining words. Your opening sentence must show what’s happening. Leave any explanations for your later paragraphs.
- Read it aloud. Get someone to read it to you (and that someone can be a computer). If tongues stumble over these words, your readers will stumble. Good opening sentences usually have their own rhythm, while bad ones have readers struggling to make sense.
Don’t worry if your first sentence doesn’t do all five mini-jobs mentioned above, but add as many as feels comfortable.
Your first sentence shouldn’t summarise your story.
Your first sentence is a hand on the reader’s elbow. It’s nudging them into the story.
Make it strange.
Make it specific.
Make it unstable.
Make your readers turn the page.
Trust the tools and keep building.
Kevin Elliott
www.writerssecrettoolkit.com
