Date: Fri, 30 Sep 2005 18:33:21 -0500 From: Real White Guy Subject: The Hook - Getting off to a good start One of the most important tasks in any story is to get your reader engaged as quickly as possible. When the reader clicks on your link and your story first loads in the browser, in most cases the reader does not know if you are a great writer, an average writer, or a dreadful writer. Except in cases where your name has become familiar, he or she has no idea whether the story will be be hot and fun or lame and dull. So, you'd better get that reader interested fast. The purpose of the first few lines in your story should be as follows: 1) To establish the situation and protagonists and to get the plot moving. 2) To spark the reader's interest so he or she will keep reading. Without presuming to render judgment as to whether I am a good writer, average writer, or dreadful writer, I would like to share a few of the rules and techniques I use when setting up my stories. Rule #1: Keep it short and punchy. When I click on a story and am confronted by an endlessly long paragraph describing the writer's background, upbringing, and previous sexual resume, I tend to do something that I believe many readers tend to do: I hit the back button and look for another story. Now, if the writer is a famous person whose life I am interested in learning about, I may tolerate an introductory dissertation because I understand that it may provide me with some essential background to understand that notable person's motives, etc. But since most of the writers on Nifty are not famous people, and since Nifty is an erotic stories archive, not a biography archive, I am really not inclined to slog through alot of personal history before getting to the meat (take that any way you like) of the story. And if the protagonist's background, etc., is really important to the story itself, that information is better introduced gradually in the story, and it is better introduced through the character's actions and modes of expression than through a page-long introduction. Technique #1: Start with dialogue. One of my favorite techniques is to begin with a bit of dialogue that quickly sets up the basic situation, reveals something about the characters, or otherwise gets the reader thinking: "Gee, I wonder what happens next?" Here are a couple of examples I've used in previous stories: ~~~~~~~~~~ >From "Pool Party": "I got an invitation to a pool party. Let's go." "Oh, Geez," I said. "I'm not a pool party person." "Oh, c'mon," Jarod said. "It'll be fun. Maybe I can meet some cute white boys. And you might meet some hot black studs." "I don't look good in a swim suit," I said. "Bullshit. You look fine in a swimsuit. Don't be such a wuss." "Okay," I sighed. "Let me see if I can find my swimsuit." "I'll be over to pick you up at seven." Click. ~~~~~~~~~~ >From "Creme Brulee": "I drive a Beamer." "I drive a Lexus." "I have a place in the Hamptons." Okay, so I'm exaggerating a little bit. But that was basically how the conversation was going. ~~~~~~~~~~ Both of these snippets accomplish certain goals. The first example quickly establishes several facts and tells the reader a number of things about the speakers: 1) The are going to a pool party. 2) They are both gay or at least interested in men. 3) They know each other well and speak in ways that imply a familiarity and comfort level with each other. 4) The dialogue implies that one speaker (Jarod) is black and likes white guys, and that the narrator (as yet unnamed) is white and likes black guys. This is implied although not explicitly stated, and the later action confirms this. 5) Jarod comes across as more outgoing and socially adventurous. The narrator comes across as more socially withdrawn. The second example is really more of a gag than an actual dialogue, but it quickly sets the tone of the story. The narrator is obviously in the presence of a few people who are overly impressed with themselves and the things they own. And the narrator clearly does not hold them in nearly the same high regard. In both of these examples, the conversations serve as "set up shots," similar to the way in which the director of "The Golden Girls" might start with an exterior shot of the house before moving inside to begin the show's real action. In another story, I use a conversation in a slightly different way. In this example, the conversation is used to present the central problem of the story. It's a slightly longer conversation: ~~~~~~~~~~ >From "The Black Thing": "So," he said, slowly stirring his mocha latte, "Tell me about yourself." I was taken aback. This was not at all what I had had in mind. I looked around the coffee shop, trying to think of what I should say. The place seemed suddenly very small to me. But there he sat, quietly stirring his coffee drink with an enigmatic smile on his face. Just calmly waiting for my reply. I decided to punt. "Well, uh. what do you want to know? I'm 40 years old...a lawyer...previously divorced with no kids." He waved his hand casually as if to brush my words aside. "No, you know that's not what I mean," he said, still smiling and stirring his coffee. "Let's talk about the Black thing." "What do you mean?" I asked, trying to sound innocent. The smile disappeared, and a look of mild impatience crossed his face. "Why do you like Black guys?" ~~~~~~~~~~ In this example, as in the first one, a lot of information is conveyed by implication rather than by explication. We get the picture that the narrator is a white man sitting at a table with a black man (although neither fact is explicitly stated). We also get a clear sense that the black guy is in control of the conversation, and the white guy is on the defensive. And even though a fair amount of information has been conveyed in most of the examples (the possible exception being "Creme Brulee,") all of the examples do this with a minimum of explication. You'll note that in my opening conversations, I tend to leave the reader a little bit in the dark as to what's exactly going on. The conversations read as if they were excerpted from the middle of the story. But in each of the examples I've cited above, these conversations are the first things the reader reads. There is nothing prior to these conversation (except for an Albert Ellis quote in the case of "Crazy"). There is a logic to this approach. While every story has a beginning, a middle, and an end, the story occurs in a longer time context. The characters are born long before the story begins, and they die long after it has ended. So in a sense, the reader is joining the characters in the middle of things, and he or she has to play a little bit of catch up to understand what is going on. This has the effect of hooking the reader. The key to is to provide just enough detail so the reader can understand the basic action and direction of things, but not so much detail as to slow the action down. After all, the "hook" exists for the purpose of raising the questions that the rest of the story will answer. In all of the examples, the conversations establish some sort of relationship between the narrator and some other character, which brings us to my second rule: Rule #2: Get the characters interacting as quickly as possible. In nearly all of my stories, my narrators (I prefer to write in the first-person) spend some time alone, but they never do so at the beginning of the story. If the initial action of your story takes place on a neighborhood basketball court, start on the basketball court. Don't describe the drive to the basketball court unless something relevant to the story is happening in your car on the way over. Technique #2: Start with an erotic teaser. This technique focuses on some aspect of the object of desire in order to establish the protagonist's erotic interest. Here is an example of that technique: ~~~~~~~~~~ >From "Anthony the Mover": It was the smile that got me first. It started as a hint, a subtle curl of the upper lip. The lips were medium-full, smooth dark chocolate with a hint of pink where they led into the mouth. Then the smile grew, and the eyes joined in. Pale brown eyes, so pale that they offered a stark challenge to the full black brows and coffee-colored skin. Then the smile broke like sunlight. The lips parted in dazzling pearl white teeth and a strawberry pink tongue. "Taste me," it seemed to say. "Feel this soft pink tongue against your soft pink tongue, white boy." Oh, yes. That smile definitely got my attention. ~~~~~~~~~~ Technique #3: Set up an outrageous or puzzling situation. This technique poses a puzzle to the reader, who then keeps reading to find out what happens. ~~~~~~~~~~ >From "Crazy": >From the moment I met him, I knew that Clovis was a little different. No. Let me rephrase that. >From the moment I met him, I knew that Clovis was crazy as hell. My first clue was his T-shirt. Now, I didn't just fall off the turnip truck, and I have seen more than a few wild outfits in my time. I just have never seen them in the foyer of an exclusive (and I mean seriously exclusive) four-star chi-chi restaurant like the one we were in. And this was not in some trendy coastal metropolis where people are sometimes blase about this sort of thing. This was in freaking Dallas, Texas, for crying out loud. Now, why someone would wear a T-shirt to a place like that in the first place is cause enough for valid questioning of the T-shirt wearer's sanity. But when the T-shirt in question has the words "THINK KINK!" emblazoned in huge bright pink glittery letters on a black background, the matter is no longer about questioning the person's sanity. You can pretty much just hand him his certificate right there on the spot. Just go ahead and call the men in white to come pick him up. He's nuts. There's just no two ways about it. ~~~~~~~~~~ A good opening can hook the reader, establish the basic facts he or she needs to know, and set the direction for the rest of the story. In most of my stories, I write the beginning first, often without knowing precisley how the story is going to end. Once the characters, tone, and beginning plot are set in motion, the rest of the tale tends to tell itself, I have found. I've given a few pointers and examples here. Of course, there are other ways to accomplish this as well. Getting off to a good start is half the battle.