Forum: Author Hangout

Honestly, the "start with action then jump back in time" thing is so overdone, I would avoid it entirely.

It's much propounded by publishers. With today's short attention spans, the formula says that if the first page doesn't grip the reader, the overall readership will suffer.

I don't like it. I rarely use it myself. But then I'm very unlikely to churn out formulaic stories like David Baldacci or James Patterson.

AJ

The first page should grip the reader.

That's actually a relatively modern ideal.

I personally don't mind a slow starter provided the blurb indicates the subject matter will go in a direction that interests me.

One criticism I've come across from writing experts is that if you try to hook readers by starting with a bang on the first page, they'll expect the bangs to occur on every other page too. Baldacci is good at that, but then his protagonists and antagonists are light on character development.

I guess it depends on the author and their target audience, if they're writing professionally.

AJ

I personally don't mind a slow starter provided the blurb indicates the subject matter will go in a direction that interests me.

That's why, long before I write word one of the story (to see whether the concept has 'legs' or not), I concentrate on the blurb, not only stating the characters' names (so they feel at least a preliminary association with them), but my blurbs all start with a clear statement of the story's main conflict, so they'll know what the story's about, regardless of how long the story takes to unfold.

But then I tend to write medical/scientific mysteries, where the protagonists rarely comprehend what they're facing until well into the story, up until then, they're mainly piecing together the available clues and trying to guess what's going on so they can formulate a plan for how to combat it. That's not exactly the stuff of high drama--which is why I focus on complex, rich characters, to keep the reader focused on the characters, giving the plot time to develop at it's own pace.

It's a fine balance. The first page should grip the reader. Action is a fine way to do that. I mean, I don't want to start reading a story in which nothing happens for the first 5 pages. But action isn't the only way to do it. It could be foreshadowing a mystery, for example.

Actually, in my much older novel A House Divided I took that approach, as the 1,000+ word prologue focused on the preliminary murder itself, displaying how unexpected and sensational it was (thereby focusing on the readers' emotions, rather than the still unidentified protagonists). There, the short prologue drew the reader in, giving them first-hand knowledge that the protagonist's didn't yet know.

Given that, I can better see how to employ that strategy, though at the time, I didn't see it as an 'action-based' beginning to hook readers, back then it was simply a prologue, featuring events that occur before the start of the story. That fine distinction seems to have made all the difference, rather than focusing an an unknown character's emotional reactions to events.

Things that require a lot of world building.

Yet even in those circumstances, the (modern) emphasis is to focus on diminishing the background details (data dump) and instead releasing that information over the course of the book, where readers are more apt to retain the knowledge, as it's easier to absorb and process a line or two at a time, than a 10,000 word history lesson.

In my own extensive science fiction/fantasy stories, I NEVER begin with an extended history lesson, instead focusing on the characters and the initial mystery they're facing. That way, readers appreciate why it's so important to them, even if it's not terribly earth-shattering until much later in the story.

I have one in my library, traditionally published book (copyright 2014) that starts with 30+ paragraphs of background material "from the journal of" a secondary character.

Yeah, a six-year backstory flashback IS a huge data dump, and typically fails for precisely the same reasons. But presumably, those 30+ paragraphs at least provide enough context to appreciate what the protagonist is experiencing, rather than forcing the (this) reader to guess what her motivations are. It was my inability to relate to the central character which threw me out of the story (ex: why was an American sent to Paris, who was the briefly mentioned person her 'reason' for choosing this assignment (presumably her daughter, though that was never mentioned), or why she'd turn on a dime from not wanting to kill a child to deciding to slaughter an innocent child. What a waste of a rich personal conflict, an ideal opportunity squandered simply in order to please the current generation of publishers.

But again, that's why I'm focusing on when these techniques work, and why they typically fail, so rather than barring the techniques, helping us as authors to appreciate the nuances of the strategy.

In my opinion, the "start with an action sequence" only really works if the entire story is action/adventure focused

My WIP novel is not an action/adventure story, yet it starts with an action scene. In the first sentence, the reader is immediately thrown into the battle ("The burst of bullets…"). In the opening scene, the reader is introduced to the MC and there are also things that happen that are used later in the story. It establishes the setting (date, place, etc.) and throws the reader into the MC's life. These are the 1st 2 paragraphs:

The burst of bullets from a German MG 42 machine gun, followed by the distinctive sound of a mortar being fired, sent the Third Platoon of Charlie Company scurrying in all directions. The American soldiers had been plodding down the road toward the small Italian town from the south when all hell broke loose. The mortar round exploded fifty feet from Corporal Boyd Harken with a thunderous BOOM! that shook the earth. The sting of shrapnel ripped his Army fatigue sleeve below his left shoulder and tore through the flesh. It also felt like someone had kicked him in the back of his thigh.

The spread-out members of his platoon dashed for cover, all except the two forward soldiers. Kincaid and Johnston lay dead, their bodies riddled with bullets from Hitler's Buzzsaw, the name the American soldiers had given to the dreaded German MG 42 machine gun. It could fire so fast that it could literally saw you in half.

Asimov mentioned a problem he was having with a story to Campbell, the great SF editor.
"Isaac, when a good writer can't get a story to gel, he's usually starting to tell it at the wrong place, and 9 times out of 10, too early."
You can provide necessary information in flashbacks -- the years leading up to this are seldom necessary.

Vonnegut advised (and I am paraphrasing here as I am shit with quotes) that you should start the story as close to the end as reasonably possible and fill in backstory as needed. That obviously should not be the basis for every story or even most stories, but if done right, can be great.

He was promoting a starting scene near the end, then continue the story from that point while putting in bits of the back story as it progresses. Think of it like starting with an assassin moving to the assassination site and as he walks through the forest he thinks about how he got his orders in a short flash back, then he's back in the forest moving through a difficult part where the rifle's length is an issue and he has a short flashback about why he started using this rifle and not a shorter one. Vonnegut promoted putting some short flashbacks into the linear progression of the story from where you started to where you end it. He did not promote starting just before the end then jumping way back and doing a linear progression to where he started. It's this later that's being promoted now.

I am not an author. Just a consumer of books, comic books, movies, and television.

That's fine, as typically, we authors end up fighting with one another about our strategies and storytelling approaches, which is why reader feedback is so essential in these discussions.

Heck, my initial observation was based on my personal reading experience, which informed my author opinion, grounding it and giving my future work more context.

Vonnegut advised (and I am paraphrasing here as I am shit with quotes) that you should start the story as close to the end as reasonably possible and fill in backstory as needed. That obviously should not be the basis for every story or even most stories, but if done right, can be great.

That makes sense, because most of Vonnegut's work featured extensive histories (about the war effort, the SOP (Standard Operating Procedures) and how those same procedures so often go wrong, ruining the militias grand plans.

However, I've also learned (over the course of many years) that only a rare story is even suitable to relying on flashbacks, as most novels simply can't support the structure they depend on. For me, the main restriction on using flashbacks is learning to appreciate when and why they're suitable.

Also, the book you actually describe sounds like it would have to be intentionally humorous or hacky to start with an assassinate Hitler plot point.

You can decide for yourself, as the book in question is Cara Black's Three Hours in Paris. While I wouldn't personally suggest purchasing the book, there should be abundant reviews online. But, to answer your question, aside from the 'comedy of errors', the author was VERY serious about the topic, not slowing a hint of humor in the small amount I read of it.

an introduction at the end or near the end and then a jump back an a normal linear narrative to get to the "present" of the start of the story is boring.

I agree it might be overdone, but it's not boring. In the movie "Casino," the MC gets blown up in a car. Then the story begins and at the end you learn he didn't die in the explosion. In the movie "Gentlemen," the MC gets shot in the head. Then the story begins. At the end, you learn that the blood that splattered wasn't his and he didn't die. Overdone, yes. Boring, no.

I liken that to showing a person a great cake, then telling them they can't have any for 2 months, and then only until after they dieted and lost 10 pounds.

Wonderful analogy, Ernest. Maybe we'll have more luck starting a description of successful/unsuccessful analogies, as I'd guess most of us have more real-world experience with both.

By the way, I have no clue what Lonely Bones is, but when Lovely Bones was first released (2002, which is a full seven years before the movie was finally produced) it physically moved me to tears multiple times. In fact, it was so good, that I abjectly refused to watch the movie butcher it.

But your strategy of staring with action and then continuing from there makes more sense, but it still potentially leaves you with a situation where readers have trouble relating the experiences to a largely unidentified protagonist. Care to expand how that plays out in your stories?

This book was incredibly powerful, and I don't think the opening detracted from it, even if we didn't know all the characters the survivor references in the opening pages.

Actually, that seems to parallel the other 'successful' uses, in that the context comes (I'm guessing) from the physical description, rather than needing context concerning the particular character, which would only be related over time.

Thus it's similar to my murder-mystery prologue, the reader is left captivated by the horror of the situation, well before they're introduced to the protagonists. My initial post concerned an otherwise exciting introduction being spoiled because I knew nothing at all of the motivations of the protagonist. But it does help to put some basis behind which implementations work and which don't, which is what I was after in the first place.

By the way, everyone, I was really nervous about broaching this topic initially, but you've all done an excellent job of arguing your points, and I've got a much better feel for how to approach this in the future, as my previous non-mystery uses were ultimately misguided.

I'll have to disagree that dialog, even an intense argument counts as "action".

Yes, you need to hook the reader, but if your hook doesn't reflect what the entire story is like/about you could leave readers feeling like a victim of a bait and switch.

I agree with you 100% that the hook needs to reflect the story. That's why I said it should fit the overall narrative. It's a bad idea to simply throw an action sequence into an opening scene just to have some sort of James Bond moment. If it doesn't fit the theme of the book then it's a really bad idea.

As for an argument counting as "action" perhaps I didn't state that as clearly as I should have. I'm not referring to just as simple argument. What I was picturing in my head was something akin to a shouting match between parents who are on the verge of divorce and the main character is perhaps one of their children who is hearing it. I meant the type of argument where you're almost on the verge of calling the police to step in. That sort of argument could indeed be some sort of action sequence.

My only point was that an action sequence can be a very broad thing and is more due to the intensity of the scene rather than any one particular piece of action. But again, it does need to stick with the overall theme and flow of the book.

that falls short of actual physical violence is not an "action sequence".

I would consider a horse race scene with the horses running nose to nose until the end to be an action scene. No physical violence.

that falls short of actual physical violence is not an "action sequence".

I would consider a horse race scene with the horses running nose to nose until the end to be an action scene. No physical violence.

So let's move away from the 'action scene' description. As long as there's a significant conflict, early enough to inform readers what the main story conflict is, you're set. A vocal argument, however spiteful, probably isn't enough to kick-start your story, but two men fighting over the same girl, or competing for the same job, probably is. Or, in my case, introducing the sex too early for readers to understand how it relates to the overall story, is just kicking the literary stump! It hurts like hell, but accomplishes nothing.

My point was that an argument that falls short of physical violence is not an action sequence.

When I talk to people about "show don't tell," I tell them you show through dialogue and action. So to your point, dialogue isn't action.

Jack Nicholson and Tom Cruise, "You need me on that wall!" in A Few Good Men? I know it's not at the start of the movie, but the physical action in the scene is basically sitting, standing, walking, staring, and maybe an arm wave or two. The scene is almost all dialog, but surely it is an "action sequence"? Or, maybe I'm just confusing "dramatic impact" with "action."

First off, authors should always be leery of emulating motion pictures, as they're two very different devices. It's tempting, because after this long, we all think in terms of movies, but novels remain popular because they are so much richer than an hour and a half film.

But, addressing your point, that's what 'show don't tell' is all about. You can actually say more by not telling readers what's happening, but by showing them through the characters' actions. However, you can't to that by thinking in terms of film.

What you need, are 'action identifiers', where instead of "John said" you switch to describing what the current speaker is doing—as a clue to how they're thinking. It takes a while to get the hang off, as it's not always intuitive, but it can add a lot to a passage, by registering a character's doubt, insincerity, hesitancy, but also they're physical reaction to whomever they're speaking with (i.e. more than just waving their hands during a dramatic scene).

However, you can't to that by thinking in terms of film.

What you need, are 'action identifiers', where instead of "John said" you switch to describing what the current speaker is doing

I believe those two statements are contradictory.

When I write, I think in terms of film otherwise all I'm doing is telling. I put in words what the reader would be seeing on the screen.

To achieve that, in my opinion, you would have to describe the physical appearance of the characters and scenery down to the smallest detail.

Nope. Not that level of detail. You can describe something and allow the reader to fill in the parts not described. They will still "see" the character, and their own flavor of the character.

but that is not you putting in words what the reader would be seeing on the screen.

Describing a character is a small part of what I'm saying. I guess it's the "show don't tell" but I no longer use that term in this forum.

As a reader, I find authors trying to create a cinematic experience in a book to be a turn off.

And I find authors telling me a story is boring and a turn off.

the author focused on writing a book rather than a screen play.

A screenplay is not a movie. It's what movies are made from. It's mostly dialogue. A lot of what you see on screen is not from the screenplay, but is the actor's and/or director's interpretation of what the screenplay author wrote.

For me, someone watching a movie has a visual experience. They see things happen, hear things. As an author, I want the reader to have that same visual experience, but in their mind.

In a movie, the movie-goer jumps when an unexpected explosion happens. He hears the loud bang and sees the flash and things flying everywhere. My goal as an author is to give him that same experience, maybe even make him jump while reading, not to tell him "A bomb suddenly went off and it was loud."

If the movie visual experience is all you are going to give me

You're taking that too literally.

If the movie visual experience is all you are going to give me

You're taking that too literally.

Not at all, that's literally what you're saying! There's zero change of someone interpreting it any other way.

A screenplay is not a movie. It's what movies are made from. It's mostly dialogue. A lot of what you see on screen is not from the screenplay, but is the actor's and/or director's interpretation of what the screenplay author wrote.

Hardly! Have you ever read a screenplay, especially a successful one? The majority are notes to the actions concerning how they should act to give meaning to their actions.

However, just as you point out with physical descriptions, you can describe a character until you're blue in the face (or at least your fingers turn blue), and they'll still create the character in their own eyes (typically based on the cover photo of an unknown model, rather than the underlying character). The key is not to emulate the inherently limited medium of film, but to expand on what literature offers that no other medium can--which are typically either internal thoughts (fairly crude) and exploring their mental state (requiring a bit more effort).

Hardly! Have you ever read a screenplay, especially a successful one? The majority are notes to the actions concerning how they should act to give meaning to their actions.

And they are only about 100 pages long on average. And that is with all the extra spaces and stuff thrown in to make scenes, direction, character appearance, etc.

One of the screenplays that was rejected multiple times was that for "Star Wars". It was exceedingly dense, and unusually long at just over 170 pages. And most companies that Lucas approached thought it was "unfilmable". And huge chunks of that 172 pages were never filmed, or left on the cutting room floor.

But character descriptions are normally done only once, at the start. Then only changes in costume and appearance as it changes throughout the film. Like say the degradation of Michael Douglas during "Falling Down", or the restoration and return to a normal appearance in "The Mummy".

Details for things like set are normally not in the screenplay itself. That is more of a directors and actors note for what to say, how to move, and a general idea of how a set will look. More detailed information is found in set dressing guides. Those can often be 4-8 times as thick as the screenplay, and are something completely different.

Normally, the entire set is left up to the set designer, who's own imagination rules the day (and ultimately decides how the whole film 'looks').

That is also up to the producer and director.

Some are well known for allowing almost anything, but others are known for being very particular, and insisting that everything be exactly how they want it.

Lucas and Spielberg fall among the latter. While those that produce say DC or Marvel films simply copy what was in the comics in the first place so have actually little actual input in this way.

However, sometimes even that can influence the other way. For example, in Superman, his "Fortress of Solitude" had always been visualized as a giant gold door on a mountainside, with a giant key nearby that only he could lift. But Richard Donner did not like this, and had it grow organically from a crystal that Jor-El sent to Earth with his son.

And this is the visualization that DC quickly picked up on and has been the image ever since, in both comics and movies.

But again, that's why I keep repeating that authors shouldn't emulate film or TV, since they're such different mediums. We need to be more mindful of descriptions, both for setting the story in a specific time/location/environment, but also to inform readers of who each character is.

Again, I'm not comparing a novel to a screenplay. And, yes, novels and movies are different mediums.

What I'm saying is I want the reader to have the same sensual experience reading a book as watching a movie. In novels, you do it with words. In movies, you do it with visual and sound.

But there are many similarities even though they are accomplished in different ways. In movies, you have camera angles. You accomplish that in novels with perspectives (POV). In movies, the moviegoer experiences the movie actions, sensory details, character expressions, and so on. In novels, that is done via "show don't tell" rather than tell through narration to allow the reader to experience that. And so on.

I never said a cinematically written novel was the same as a movie.

As a reader, I find authors trying to create a cinematic experience in a book to be a turn off.

And I find authors telling me a story is boring and a turn off.

I myself have thrown away hundreds of books in the very first chapter because of the techniques you're specifically trying to emulate. If you admire the visual medium so much, then why waste your time writing fiction, why not invest your time in scriptwriting?

As a reader, I find authors trying to create a cinematic experience in a book to be a turn off.

I can't think of any SOL authors who do that, not that I'm particularly proficient on the SOLiverse. But my covid-becalmed writers' group has discussed one or two famous authors who try to write in a cinematic style. Anecdotally, one particular author was doing it because he didn't want anyone else to write the screenplay after a bad experience with a previous novel. I wish I could remember the author's name ...

AJ

famous authors who try to write in a cinematic style

"In Cinematic Fictions, professor David Seed shows how more than a dozen writers—including Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Faulkner, Dos Passos, Steinbeck, and Nathanael West—deploy elements such as the narrator acting like an observing camera, switching perspective from one character to another, the use of editing, or a kinship with documentary that link their prose to screen practices."

I don't know about the other things listed, but when I say cinematic I mean the part that says: "deploy elements such as the narrator acting like an observing camera."

I see movies and books as very different media, things that work for one don't necessarily work for the other.

Exactly! Why do a crappy imitation of one when you can excel at the other?

Yet, there are other ways of conveying action than to merely imitate movies.

Replacing attributions with action attributions goes a long way towards that, as they're not descriptions, but help to fill extended dialogue with regular updates of what the character are doing, without telling readers anything about what the characters are feeling

Hence, that's imitating movies.

You're showing what's happening in movies (the viewer sees it before his eyes) and you imitate that in novels by showing what's happening through words.

You're showing what's happening in movies (the viewer sees it before his eyes) and you imitate that in novels by showing what's happening through words.

Then you have authors that go in another direction.

Tom Clancy was famous for writing incredibly dense books, most of that made up of technical information. But told in a way that kept readers entertained.

However, interestingly enough other than the Ryan Family, he hardly ever went into much details about the appearance of a character. This is why when the first movie was made, the roles of Admiral Greer and Jones were cast as black men. Many accused Clancy of writing all white characters, where he himself said that to him, race is not important and that the reader could make his characters other than the main obvious ones any race they wanted.

And after The Hunt for Red October was made, he then made sure when he wrote any future books with those characters, they were explicitly stated that they were black. I actually write almost the same way. To me, most of the time the race does not matter so I do not mention it. Which surprised me as I was writing the death scene of one character and reading back through all their interactions, and I realized I had never once mentioned he was specifically supposed to be black.

And more than one reader when I posted that chapter expressed surprise, as until I described his complexion after he had a heart attack they had just assumed he was white. And in another the character was blind. And never realized that the husband of her best friend was Mexican-American. Once again, was not all that important to me, but I put it in to show how perceptions can be false. And ultimately, it does not matter all that much.

Tom Clancy was famous for writing incredibly dense books, most of that made up of technical information. But told in a way that kept readers entertained.

I typically do that, but since most of my stories are based on specific scientific properties, I delve into in-depth descriptions of those principals in action, told in an everyday vernacular (typically through a teenager, who's not particularly trained in quantum physics).

There's the attention to detail you typically find in gun/sex/motor porn, which essentially just gets repeated multiple times in different settings, and the 'add depth' and immersion of specific details to 'ground' the reader in a specific scene/environment.

Again, in film you're thinking visually, while in fiction you're thinking 'descriptions'.

That's the crux of it. In fiction, you are still thinking visually, but conveying it through words (description). Words that create a visual image.

That's the crux of it. In fiction, you are still thinking visually, but conveying it through words (description). Words that create a visual image.

I prefer to think of it as descriptions which create emotional responses, rather than visual images. When I focus on showing, it's not to SHOW someone's facial expressions, it's to convey how they're feeling in that instant, without actually TELLING the reader what they're actually thinking. I think that's the crux of our disagreement on this topic, you're still visually focused, where I'm trying to convey the characters' inter turmoils and conflicts.

To achieve that, in my opinion, you would have to describe the physical appearance of the characters and scenery down to the smallest detail.

Nope. Not that level of detail. You can describe something and allow the reader to fill in the parts not described. They will still "see" the character, and their own flavor of the character.

Again, that's my main objection to adopting your 'based on the movies' approach, as it minimizes the strength of novels. Sure, movies pull in a TON more money, and captivates fans, but books are (generally) much longer lasting. Novels are often read in private, while movies are discussed over watercoolers (before Covid-19, that is). Readers are reluctant to mention books because there are now so many who seem incapable of reading. They all know how, they're simply uninterested in it.

Yet, books open readers to worlds they've never imagined, whether that's surviving on Mars or simply someone trying to survive against the odds in current society. We may get a slightly glimpse of those circumstances in movies, but it rarely goes beyond that.

I'll have to disagree that dialog, even an intense argument counts as "action".

Yes, you need to hook the reader, but if your hook doesn't reflect what the entire story is like/about you could leave readers feeling like a victim of a bait and switch.

As always—at least for me—the key is clearly establishing the main story conflict early, while you're still introducing the characters. There are many ways to introduce the characters, but without understanding the central conflict and how they all fit into it, readers can't evaluate whether the book is for them or not.

So, I agree, a verbal fight isn't sufficient, as it essentially had little to do with the underlying plot. Now, a husband planning to assassinate his wife, then you have both the context and the conflict clearly laid out and established. Time to move on from there, either with action or merely more dialogue.

Whether it's through action, or just a very engaging main character I need to be hooked. An action sequence to begin with is one way of doing that. Unlike what someone said before, I don't think an action sequence only works if the book is action based. Action doesn't necessarily have to involve bullets flying. An action sequence in a book can be dragons coming at you, an intense argument between characters, or even a dream/nightmare. Whatever it is though should fit the overall narrative and not stick out like a sore thumb.

That's what I discovered in my most recent book. I'd started it with a dramatic scene with the protagonist catching his sister in bed with her best friend (to illustrate the powers that's drawing them all towards each other), but without any pretext, it'll probably kill sales. It's one thing to read a scene you're not especially fond of because you can see the character doing it, but without the context, you just don't care, and thus it's just not worth wading through the unpleasant scene to discover the underlying principal.

It's probably too late to change it, but I really should have caught it much earlier. It seems that context is everything. The book I bitched about had none! The strategies you're suggesting should provide the necessary context, but it's easier to propose than it is to implement, since we never realize our limitations until we fall flat on our faces. But I think I've got a much better feel for it now, so hopefully the rest of my stories won't have the same issues.

My next story has one guy and two girlfriends, but due to what he's dealing with, there is NO sex nor any real sexual commitment between the parties. They're willing to risk their lives to help each other, but it still doesn't change their intimacy with each other. (i.e. there are no 'embarrassing scenes to be 'gotten through', so hopefully they'll either like the story or hate it, crudely implemented techniques notwithstanding.)

But given the nature of my stories, it's always better to understand the character first, before the protagonists get involved with trying to resolve the underlying conflict. There's just no way to avoid that, so trying to rush things isn't likely to help.

If nothing else, it helps knowing why my most recent stories weren't more popular than my other stories have been.

However, in one case I did the exact opposite. I pretty much started it in action, then periodically during the narration I would have the main character have a flashback to how things came to be the way they are. Which in following books I expanded on by having both of them start years before the present day.

The key question then, is how did that book fair in comparison to your others? Was the technique successful (i.e. did it make the book more successful), or did you miss your mark, ultimately harming the book by discouraging readers just as they were getting started?

Again, theory is one thing, but the implementation is where the rubber meets the road (another overused cliche).

The key question then, is how did that book fair in comparison to your others? Was the technique successful (i.e. did it make the book more successful), or did you miss your mark, ultimately harming the book by discouraging readers just as they were getting started?

Well, it is one of the highest rated of my stories, and has spawned 2 sequels (the third still being written). With over 100k downloads. So I would say it went over well indeed.

However, primarily I am s "story teller". 90% of my posting in here are a single chapter. Only 1 non-serial book, and 7 books over 2 different series.

And I did a lot of experimentation with that story though. For example, I opened the story "cold", with it almost immediately jumping into action, and the reader possibly wondering at the sanity (or sexuality) of the narrator.

The "cold open" I actually took a lot of influence from "Hill Street Blues" of all places. The entire series began like any other, with absolutely no explanation of who anybody was, or what they did. You had to figure it all out as the story progressed. And the rest, it was actually relating to a key plot point of the story.

Plus, it was my first "dark story", as mostly prior to that I had written "light and fluffy love stories". That was my first real journey into writing about violence and crime.

The key question then, is how did that book fair in comparison to your others? Was the technique successful (i.e. did it make the book more successful), or did you miss your mark, ultimately harming the book by discouraging readers just as they were getting started?

Well, it is one of the highest rated of my stories, and has spawned 2 sequels (the third still being written). With over 100k downloads. So I would say it went over well indeed.

In that case, it's a pretty clear signal that you've struck the nail on the head, achieving maximum impact, rather than merely stringing the reader along, forcing them to wade thorough irrelevant background data.

As I've said, my main objection to 'data dumps' is that the human brain can only grasp so much data at any one time. That's the reason why I restrict my sentences to a single concept at a time. I don't object to complex sentences, but the information has to be paced so readers have time to properly absorb it. So, you state the main point, allow the reader time to process after the full stop, and then state the various complications triggered by the main idea. Stating them at the same time not only diminishes the main point, readers also don't pick up the nuances and inherent warnings.

The same is true for background data. It's better delivered a piece at a time, when there's some context to it, so readers can not only absorb it, but there's some context for them to relate it to the ongoing story. Dumping that information in a prologue robs it of any relevance to the main protagonists. After all, who can relate to a person's 100 year family history before they even know anything about that character. Without knowing who he is, and how it impacts them, it's meaningless.

However, although it flies in the face of my other observations (about introducing the character first), I'm guessing that by starting cold, the action itself caught the readers' attention (unlike my example, where an otherwise exciting assassination attempt become a bumbling comedy of errors, because readers didn't know how to interpret it).

Sometimes it's a difficult line to hoe, figuring out how exactly where the line is, but the key concept is how well the reader absorbs the information, rather than where it occurs.

In that case, it's a pretty clear signal that you've struck the nail on the head, achieving maximum impact, rather than merely stringing the reader along, forcing them to wade thorough irrelevant background data.

I hate that also, which is why I made the choice to only provide the data that was important as the story progressed.

First the realization that the main character was a "Paladin", a superhero with invulnerability, enhanced strength, and other abilities. Then in a flashback the "event" that gave people those powers. Then more story, then another flashback to the Government organizing a new governmental department to deal with the people with these abilities.

Just chunks at a time, as they were needed. I did not like the idea of doing a "Princess Irulan prologue" that goes on forever explaining the entire history prior to getting into the story itself. Plus, it gave me the freedom to continue to do that in future stories if I decided to add something new. No "retconning" needed, just mention something that was obviously there before, but had been of no importance to any of the other characters previously.

Like say, how their government ID was also a drivers license. Of no importance to the character in the first story, they had been driving for years and had a license. But for the second story, the main character had been blind before the event, so had no license and did not know how to drive.

What I try to do is lead with, not action, but with the central conflict. Don't always manage that (too many of my stories start with a disrupted status quo ante instead of a protagonist with a goal) but I usually like best those stories where I manage that.

In my case, the very first thing I write (aside from choosing the character names) is the story description, which clearly highlights the central conflict.

I've found that, by keeping that in front of me at all times, I'll know whether the story is on target or not, or whether I'll need to cut a particular subplot. Subplots that develop the characters are fine, but even that character development must ultimately move the plot forward.

Of course, as you noted, you generally have to establish what the character's situations is, before you wreck it with the instigating scene, but having a clear idea of the central conflict usually keeps the story on a tight leash.

Though, that generally doesn't work with 'steam of consciousness' storytelling, where you simply let your characters go and follow them through each of their days, seeing how things turn out (typically those 30+ chapter stories), which have their own appeal, but it does help keep everything moving in the same direction.

My thought is to try to do two things to entice the reader to read on introduce a character who is interesting and likeable and show his/her normal life just before the axe falls or the dam breaks. I want the reader invested in the character before the action otherwise it's just something happening to a stranger that may be interesting but who cares.

Well, for Bohica I had to take a very different approach.

It is set 5 years after an event causes a small percentage of the population to get "mutations". Most benign (change hair color at will), a small percent were major and made them super heroes or villains.

And the main character in the first story, she was a classic nobody. A 20-something slacker, changed her hair color every other month, was with a boyfriend she did not really love and they only stayed together for sex. Working as a stocker at a big box retail store, completely ordinary and largely invisible.

Now the second, I did set up more as a traditional narration. Starting from the morning of the day she became blind, and then progressing through her trials in life, becoming a mutant, then her marriage and trying to catch her first foe and ending after her daughter is born.

But there was no need to go deep into "backstory" and "foundation" this time with the universe, I had already done that in the first book. And it is an interesting series to write, as each book has a completely different POV narrator. Some of the timelines overlap, and I am enjoying telling the same segment over again, but from a completely different point of view.

Lets me play with the concept of "personal perception".

Actually, Star Wars: From the Adventures of Luke Skywalker credited to George Lucas, but ghostwritten by Alan Dean Foster, was published on 12 Nov 1976, more than a half year before the movie was released in theatres ...

Which was not uncommon in that era. The Battlestar Galactica book also came before the movie.

And Alan Dean Foster was already well known for taking things that were almost unwriteable and turning them into books. He had already done that with the Star Trek Animated series, and over 2 dozen other TV shows and movies.

Quite early working entirely from scripts, and early ones at that. This is why his books often differ from the final movie, as scenes may get cut, deleted, or added during production.

But he has stated in the past that he also helped Lucas refine his script, as in it's original format it was quite a mess. Lucas had this giant space opera already in his mind, but not much to connect them all together into a cohesive story yet. And the entire franchise still shows signs of the almost constant retconning he has done over the decades.

Like the mention of "another" in The Empire Strikes Back. Originally, that was to be Han Solo as Luke's "lost" older brother. But Lucas during Jedi changed it to being Leia. Which is something that Obiwan knew, which is why he trusted Han Solo, even though he should not have.

Re BSG, which movie are you referring to? The short-lived 1978 Canada release, later USA 1979 release that was cut/modified into the pilot, second and third episodes of the 1979/80 television series? Or the movies based on the post-Y2K remade tV series?

The original, started as a screenplay he wrote in the 1960's called "Adam's Ark". He had been actively pitching it for a decade by the time ABC finally picked it up.

The book was released in 1978, just a few months before the TV series was released in 1978. I remember my mom getting it and reading it before the movie was released.

And it was not "cut into the pilot", it was made as a pilot.

What you are remembering was their attempt to recoup some of the money spent. ABC and Universal were unable to get any firm commitments to broadcast the TV series in other countries, so 2 months before the premiere on US TV a theatrical cut was released in Canada and Europe. This is because it was decided to make a series of it, which started it's run in September. In order to catch the prime summer movie audience, it was released in other areas in July.

In fact, most of the early episodes were written as 2 hour movie treatments, and then split up into two episodes. This is why many were later released as TV movies, and the novels were of two linked episodes. Glen Larson (like Lucas) was unsure if there would be an additional order for an actual series, so planned ahead and wrote several more scripts (and books based on them) in the event it became a recurring "movie of the week" series.

This was not unusual in that era. The various "TV Movie of the Week" shows were very popular, and was a common way to test if a potential series could make it. The Love Boat actually had 3 movies broadcast in this way (1976-1977) before it was finally picked up as a series. Fantasy Island had 2 TV movies before it became a series (1977-1978).

Mostly however, the theatrical release was actually the pilot, with extra scenes added they could not show on a TV show (and also before it was unsure if it would become a series, or a series of TV movies). Most notably, the beheading of Baltar. In the theatrical cut, he was beheaded, while in the TV series he was spared and would continue on as a recurring villain.

And the movie was also released in the US the next summer. And if you bought the boxed set of the original series on DVD, it featured both versions.

Also, in the movie it was stated (as in the original book) that the Cylons were an insectoid race, and those seen were in a form of armor. That was in both the original book and screenplay, but Glen Larson had to change it because of the level of violence.

It was decided that killing scores of robots was not a problem, where as killing scores of living beings would make the show too violent.

Obviously, both movies and not books. The latter is almost ALL dialog, right up to where Sundance draws, but that surely counts as action.

There's nothing that says that dialogue can't be dramatic, but there is a major distinction between talk and actions. But, by interlacing the two together, not with long onscreen stares, but by showcasing how each character responds to what the other states, is more dramatic than a simple recitation of dry details.

The key in these scenes is not that one is action and one is dialogue, but to bring the two together—in a literary fashion rather than a purely visual one—to further enrich the story.

I think it's best to sum up the issue as:

While opening with an action scene is more likely to grab attention, the story should progress in a linear fashion from the opening scene and not have a large flashback. Nor should the opening scene be the penultimate or major action scene of the story.

I suspect another is that you can't intimate the decisions made during that initial action scene, since without experiencing them themselves, the readers are merely left befuddled, rather than enlightened.

The book that originally triggered all of this kept trying to explain why the character was having so many troubles shooting Hitler, but intimations (destined to eventually be explained later in the story) can't possibly substitute for a character's motivations. We can either feel for a character, based on their backgrounds, or we can't. But you can't tease them and expect them to continue reading the next 300 pages waiting for the answer. If the scene relies on the information, then you can't withhold it, as it's vital to the unfolding scene.

That's why I like everyone's suggestion that once you start, you move the story along linearly, moving the action along, while you interspace momentary flashbacks along the way, to inform the reader about the relevance of the action to the character. Again, in the opening scene I was reacting to, it wasn't that the action was badly handled, it was that the author kept referring to details the reader had no way to knowing, which made a mockery of the entire opening action.

We don't need to know what your character's ordinary daily life is like. … What we need to know is what makes this particular moment in their life worth telling a story about. … The ordinary is boring. Start with the out-of-the-ordinary.

Agree. Well said.

If you want a log to die, write die a log.

Die Dye, let your dye die along with you, as your bi hair-dyer also dies!

How difficult. If you want a log to die, burn it ;)

In the words of Aristotle, burning is not the death of a log, it's the log's 'actualization', what it was always meant to become (once the tree has produced several million 'seeds' that is).