How to Write the Opening Scene: Infusing Emotional Connection From Page One

I had a conversation recently with one of my writing friends. She wanted to talk about how to infuse an opening scene with emotional connection.

“Here’s the most important truism about storytelling: readers don’t care what’s happening unless we care who it’s happening to.”

Tiffany Yates Martin, Intuitive Editing: A Creative and Practical Guide to Revising Your Writing

I never want a reader to think, “So what?“ I want them to feel connected to my main character and to be invested in the story’s outcome.

How to do that? First things first. Make the main character relatable, sympathetic, and/or interesting. This is easier said than done!

An author may have to try several different approaches before hitting on the one that works for a particular story. Sometimes I’ve kept the first draft version. Other novels or stories require more rewrites and edits of first pages.

Go Deep

Dive deep into your protagonist’s head, using strong, authentic voice. This can be a tricky concept to understand and master. The reader needs to know what the character is going through, thinking, and feeling, in an immersive way. Readers read to experience the story.

Creating an immersive experience and writing in deep point of view requires a whole set of skills, many of which you probably already have. Don’t try so hard that the prose becomes awkward and unwieldy. Give yourself the freedom to express the characters’ inner and outer life, but try to avoid writing in a way that distances the reader from those experiences.

How to write in deep point of view could take pages of discussion. Gather information from multiple, respected sources when researching how to improve in this area and remember to use what serves your story best.

Set it Up

Provide enough background and scene setting, so that the reader will care, but not so much they become frustrated or bogged down.

One of my story openings did well in contests, but beta reader feedback on the novel as a whole made it obvious I needed more background information early on. My readers couldn’t stay involved in the story and became frustrated with information gaps. The character entered the stage during a dramatic moment and while this was initially intriguing, by chapter four or five the story wasn’t working as well as it could.

I’d started the story in the wrong place.

A snappy opening is useless unless it serves the story.

The same is true for too much backstory, which can stop a story in its tracks and cause readers to lose interest.

Strive for Clarity

Make sure what’s in your head makes it onto the page. Part of my issue turned out to be over editing. Important information got left out of the revised version. (Or sometimes I never included it!)

Another pitfall could be that key information is present, but conveyed in a vague way.

Voice

Ahh, the elusive voice. Writing in deep point of view can help develop a character’s voice, but voice is a combination of things.

Try freewriting, character interviews, or listen to snatches of conversation to capture an authentic voice. I’ve found that the most authentic voice happens when I least expect it, so I keep notebooks handy and scribble down lines of my characters’ internal dialogue whenever they strike me. You can try out first person, third person, past or present tense. Find what works best for your character.

Create a Mood

Use the setting to create a mood that resonates with the reader. You don’t have to be a poet to create a mood with beautiful writing. Try for specific, vivid word choices.

Make a Statement

Start with a strong statement about a universal truth. These are statements that resonate deeply with readers because we recognize them as a fact. Or at least, we recognize that as far as the character is concerned it is a fact in their story world.

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.”

Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

I Need a Hero

Readers still not connecting with the protagonist? Have your character do something heroic. This doesn’t have to be an earth shattering, out of the ordinary event. If your character shows a small kindness, it will make them more likable. Consider the book Save the Cat. Until that book came out, I didn’t realize how many characters I’d read about in novels had saved a cat or a dog. It works! Revealing the complexity of a character can help readers connect more.

Readers come to your novel intending to enjoy the book. They want to be entertained and to escape into another world. Make them care about your character. Keep them oriented and grounded. Immerse the reader in the story world. Provide enough detail so that the reader is experiencing the story, give them a character that is interesting, make them care, and provide enough clarity so they are never lost and left confused. Make sure what’s in your head is on the page.

If you do these things, readers will stick around to see what happens next.

Donna Jo Stone writes YA contemporary novels about tough issues but always ends the stories with a note of hope. She blogs at donnajostone.com.