By Jeff Gerke
I give a lot of attention to first lines. They’re a very quick indicator of a novelist’s skill level.
I can’t tell you how many novels I’ve read that begin with someone pulling up in a car (usually in front of a house) or with a weather report. Yawn. Often they begin with telling: Jim had always been a shy boy…
Or else the first line will be trying to do too much at once: “Jim’s long beard dripped with gravy from the state dinner with the Russian ambassador as he punched in the code to defuse the bomb planted there by the female Ukranian terrorist who was so beautiful it broke Jim’s already trampled heart.”
Blech.
You get only one first line. It has the most impact of any sentence in your entire book. Don’t fritter it away.
Let your first line be three things: simple, engaging, and appropriate to set the tone for the rest of the book.
Why does it need to be simple? Because you want to grab your reader by the mind and pull her into your book. You want to make it an easy access.
The first line is like the door to your store. If you’ve got an automatic door that slides aside to welcome the shopper, you’re doing well. If you’ve got a manual door that sticks and rattles, you’re not doing so well. Same with your book. The first line shouldn’t be a tripping hazard.
Why engaging? Because many readers won’t give you beyond that first line to get them hooked. So your first words had better be interesting. Look at the first sentence of something you’ve written—is it engaging? Does it suck the reader in?
And what do I mean that the first line needs to be appropriate to set the tone for the rest of the book? Keep in mind that your first line is probably the most powerful sentence in the entire manuscript. What you do here resonates through the rest of your book. You’re setting the tone, creating reader expectation, and starting your novel out just right.
If your book is a mom-lit about raising a delightful toddler, then beginning your book with “Jim killed seven men that year” probably wouldn’t start things out the way you’re wanting. Nor would “The cancer had reduced her to a pathetic shell” or “Yes, sir, Sergeant Major, sir!”
Your book might be better served by something that lets the reader know that she is, indeed, inside a mom-lit. If you’re wanting a sunny tone for your book, be sure your first line is nice and sunny.
Conversely, if you’re writing a book about Jim’s serial murders, then starting it with “Say ‘Goo-goo’ for the camera, honey” probably wouldn’t work either. The opening line needs to match what you’re doing in the book.
Here’s one of my best first lines from my Jefferson Scott novels:
Once he decided to kill himself, the rest was easy.
What do you think? Is it engaging? I hope so. Is it simple? Sure. Only one word over two syllables, and pretty short. And is it appropriate for the tone of the story? It’s from my first novel, Virtually Eliminated, which is about a high-tech serial killer, so yes, it’s appropriate.
Here’s another of my strongest first lines:
Today I’m going to kill a man in cold blood.
Not too bad, huh? Wow, who is this person? Who is he going to kill? And in cold blood? That’s awful! What’s happening?
It passes the engaging test, in other words. It’s also another very simple sentence. It glides right along and reads smoothly. Lastly, since it’s about a Navy SEAL sniper on an assassination mission—who is becoming conflicted about his job—it’s definitely appropriate for the story. (That’s from my fourth novel, Operation: Firebrand.)
Those are good first lines. It also doesn’t hurt to make your first line be about life and death, by the way.
So turn now to your current project. How does your first line stack up? How can you make it simple, engaging, and appropriate?
Excerpted from The Art & Craft of Writing Christian Fiction by Jeff Gerke. Jeff is a veteran editor and novelist who has been working in the Christian publishing industry since 1994. He is publisher of the small indie publishing house Marcher Lord Press. He writes fiction under the pen name Jefferson Scott.
Flickr photo by kretyen
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This advice is universally given as dogma for all writers. It is so very true and the one that often gives me the most difficulty and sees the most edits. I could not agree more.
I was working on a column on writing a few years back and was researching the idea of “opening lines.” In preparation for the article, I purchased a DVD of the movie The Owl and the Pussycat starring Barbra Streisand and George Segal. To sum up, Segal (Felix) is a writer and Streisand (Doris) is a hooker. They end up together, obviously, but there is a great scene in which Doris reads Felix’s novel-in-progress and just gives him the hardest time about the opening line: “The sun spit morning.” You’ll just have to watch the movie!
First line (and the paragraph that follows) launches the story. I used the first line of my current work in a trial query for a practice pitch at a conference last month and it popped a few eyeballs which I will take as promising beginning.
Nice article.
In a world of dwindling attention spans it is so encouraging to see that books can now be judged by the first sentence. We’ve gone from “The First Five Pages” to the First Five Paragraphs to the First Five Sentences and now to what? The first five syllables?
I’m not saying your opening is unimportant. I’m just saying lets not throw the whole story out with an opening sentence like:
“Outside my window a mixture of rain and snow as settling into slush on Berkeley Street.” (Robert Parker)
“The house on Old Reservoir Road appeared to be in the final phases of construction” (Sue Grafton)
“A smear of fresh blood has a metallic smell.” … okay, well, John D. McDonald is the master.
Anyway, after reading your article, I culled through my bookshelf and would say it was 40/40 on a dynamic opening line along the lines of your example and McDonalds with 20% being tossups.
So I respectfully disagree as to the “intensity” of importance you assign the very first sentence, but fully acknowledge that I am the noobie and you have tons of experience and success that bolsters your position. I feel a little silly even bothering to object, but this is an open market for opinions.
Thanks for your words of wisdom.
–John
Jeff,
True words. You never really get a second chance to make that first impression. I put a lot of thought in to the titling of my posts, and to the first line of any story. In fact, Some of my best stories are born from a great first line popping into my head.
Thanks for the great tips.
George
I really enjoyed reading this post, but I would have to agree with some of the other commenters that its not just the first line that draws a reader in. But, I would say that it is definitely the first page that matters the most to me. It takes so much effort to turn the page (insert sarcasm here) that if the story isn’t worth it, I’ll just put the book down and move on to another one.
On another note, I’m in the process of trying to write my first novel, which is still in the very very rough stages. I took a look at the first sentence after reading your take on first sentences and have decided that I don’t like mine too much. It is very wordy and doesn’t really convey what is going on in the opening pages, other than very briefly setting the scene.
Here goes:
“Kurt Thompson had been walking around the downtown streets for the last forty-five minutes searching for a butcher shop his friend and collegue Henry Davis had recommended.”
i go with first lines, and last lines… and a good title. often, i think of the title first, and go from there.
I love to read but sometimes writers are so long winded, I can’t wait to just jump to the last chapter and read the end. They start with a great opening line and then take forever to build the story. It is like using the opening line as a sales slogan to get people into the store, sale! sale!. When you get inside, you can’t find anything of interest to buy.
But audience is paramount too. An engaging first sentence for Dan Brown’s readers would be something quite different from what would engage Iris Murdoch’s readers. A first sentence can seduce by its subtlety as well as its flash. Cheap date or long-term relationship?
Honestly, I think the importance of a first sentence can be vastly overrated except in the most commercial fiction. Most serious readers, I think, are going to put sensible effort into becoming engaged with a book and will wait for the story to build rather than expect to be “hooked” by the very first sentence.
I always try to compare myself to the first line of Stephen King’s Gunslinger series:
“The gunslinger pursues the man in black through a dismal desert land.”
The first line should incite urgent questions that make me want to stay to see the answers.
There’s something really off-putting when published writers of any genre, at any level of success, cite their own work as examples of perfection, or examples to live up to.
It makes them seem untrustworthy. And it makes me wonder if they read, and if they do, if they admire anything beyond their own efforts.
The advice in this article is good. The citations make me cringe.