In the latest in Writer’s Digest‘s series of articles on mistakes writers make, Michael Woodson says it’s a mistake to start at the very beginning of your story.
In Woodson’s case, he began a story that didn’t clearly show where he intended to take it. While he received positive feedback on the quality of his writing, his beta reader wasn’t sure what the story was about or why she should invest in the characters. To work through the purpose of his story, Woodson jumped ahead to a pivotal moment between two characters, which he had planned to reveal at about the halfway point and completely change the tone of the narrative.
“Writing it was a great exercise in reminding myself of what I wanted to achieve, how I wanted the characters to change, and the stakes I wanted to pepper throughout the first half,” Woodson says. He moved those four pages to the front of the story. Chronologically, the inserted scene occurs six years before the story “begins” but it set the tone for the novel and prompted his beta reader to question what happened to the characters between the opening scene and the beginning of the novel.
