Short Story Starter Ideas Setting Description: Lush trees encircled the park. It was twelve noon and kids were going down the slide, playing tag and blowing bubbles. The sky was the bluest I had ever seen it. It was then that I noticed a dirty, mangy dog running through the park.
Character Description: Max wasn't your ordinary kid. He was super smart. He could add up 1,000,478,365 + 6,345,275, 001 without even using a calculator. With jet-black hair and sharp blue eyes, Max was in the sixth grade. In sixth grade was the Math Competition for the entire county. This year, Max's team was going to win.
Sound: Boom, Boom, Boom! The sound of the neighbor's drums echoed through the neighborhood.
Action: Describe an unbelievable or high-energy event that makes the reader want to see what happens next. Like this: I jumped out of the car and grabbed my boogie board, unable to wait any longer to get to the sand!
1. Build momentum. The first cardinal rule of opening lines is that they should possess most of the individual craft elements that make up the story as a whole. An opening line should have a distinctive voice, a point of view, a rudimentary plot and some hint of characterization. By the end of the first paragraph, we should also know the setting and conflict, unless there is a particular reason to withhold this information.
This need not lead to elaborate or complex openings. Simplicity will suffice. For example, the opening sentence of Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” tells the reader: “The grandmother didn’t want to go to Florida.” Already, we have a distinctive voice—somewhat distant, possibly ironic—referring to the grandmother with a definite article. We have a basic plot: conflict over a journey. And we have a sense of characterization: a stubborn or determined elderly woman. Although we do not know the precise setting, we can rule out Plato’s Athens, Italy under the Borgias and countless others. All of that in eight words. Yet what matters most is that we have direction—that O’Connor’s opening is not static.
Immediately, we face a series of potential questions: Why didn’t the grandmother want to go to Florida? Where else, if anywhere, did she wish to go? Who did want to go to Florida? A successful opening line raises multiple questions, but not an infinite number. In other words, it carries momentum.
2. Resist the urge to start too early. You might be tempted to begin your narrative before the action actually starts, such as when a character wakes up to what will eventually be a challenging or dramatic day. But unless you’re rewriting Sleeping Beauty, waking up is rarely challenging or dramatic. Often, when we start this way, it’s because we’re struggling to write our way into the narrative, rather than letting the story develop momentum of its own. Far better to begin at the first moment of large-scale conflict. If the protagonist’s early-morning rituals are essential to the story line, or merely entertaining, they can always be included in backstory or flashbacks—or later, when he wakes up for a second time.
3. Remember that small hooks catch more fish than big ones. Many writers are taught that the more unusual or extreme their opening line, the more likely they are to “hook” the reader. But what we’re not taught is that such large hooks also have the power to easily disappoint readers if the subsequent narrative doesn’t measure up. If you begin writing at the most dramatic or tense moment in your story, you have nowhere to go but downhill. Similarly, if your hook is extremely strange or misleading, you might have trouble living up to its odd expectations. As a fishing buddy of mine explains, the trick is to use the smallest hook possible to make a catch—and then to pull like crazy in the opposite direction.
4. Open at a distance and close in. In modern cinema, films commonly begin with the camera focused close up on an object and then draw back panoramically, often to revelatory effect, such as when what appears to be a nude form is actually revealed to be a piece of fruit. This technique rarely works in prose. Most readers prefer to be “grounded” in context and then to focus in. Open your story accordingly.
5. Avoid getting ahead of your reader. One of the easiest pitfalls in starting a story is to begin with an opening line that is confusing upon first reading, but that makes perfect sense once the reader learns additional information later in the story. The problem is that few readers, if confused, will ever make it that far. This is not to say that you can’t include information in your opening that acquires additional meaning once the reader learns more. That technique is often a highly rewarding tool. But the opening should make sense on both levels—with and without knowledge the reader will acquire later.
6. Start with a minor mystery. While you don’t want to confuse your readers, presenting them with a puzzle can be highly effective—particularly if the narrator is also puzzled. This has the instant effect of making the reader and narrator partners in crime. An unanswered question can even encompass an entire novel, as when David Copperfield asks, “Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.”
7. Keep talk to a minimum. If you feel compelled to begin a story with dialogue, keep in mind that you’re thrusting your readers directly into a maelstrom in which it’s easy to lose them. One possible way around this is to begin with a single line of dialogue and then to draw back and to offer additional context before proceeding with the rest of the conversation—a rare instance in which starting close up and then providing a panorama sometimes works. But long sequences of dialogue at the outset of a story usually prove difficult to follow.
8. Be mindful of what works. Once you’ve given some concentrated thought to your own opening line, obtain copies of anthologies like The Best American Short Stories and The PEN/O. Henry Prize Stories and read only the first sentence of each story. As with any other aspect of writing, openings are their own distinct art form—and exposure to the masterwork of others is one of the best ways to learn. (Of course, the challenge of this exercise is to avoid being lured into a story with such a compelling opening that you aren’t able to put it down!)
9. When in doubt, test several options. Writers are often advised to make a short list of titles and try them out on friends and family. Try doing the same with opening sentences. An opening line, like a title, sometimes seems truly perfect—until you come up with several even better choices.
10. Revisit the beginning once you reach the end. Sometimes a story evolves so significantly during the writing process that an opening line, no matter how brilliant, no longer applies to the story that follows. The only way to know this is to reconsider the opening sentence, like the title, once the final draft of the story is complete. Often a new opening is called for. That doesn’t mean your first opening needs to be scrapped entirely; instead, file it away for use in a future project.
Needless to say, a brilliant opening line cannot salvage a story that lacks other merits, nor will your story be accepted for publication based on the opening alone. But in a literary environment where journals and publishing houses receive large quantities of submissions, a distinctive opening line can help define a piece. A riveting opening can even serve as shorthand for an entire story, so that harried editors, sitting around a table as they evaluate the crème de la slush pile, may refer to your piece not by its title, but as “the one that begins with the clocks striking 13” (as does George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four). Even after the rest of the story has evaporated from conscious memory, the opening may stick with editors, an iron peg upon which to hang their hats—and, with any luck, it will have that effect on readers, too.
My own personal favorite opening is the first line of Elizabeth Graver’s story “The Body Shop,” which appears in The Best American Short Stories 1991. It begins: “My mother had me sort the eyes.” I dare you not to go out and read what comes next.
Short Story Starter Ideas
The air turned black all around me.
Icy fingers gripped my arm in the darkness.
Wandering through the graveyard it felt like something was watching me.
The eyes in the painting follow him down the corridor.
A shrill cry echoed in the mist
Icy wind slashed at his face and the rain danced its evil dance upon his head as he tried to get his bearings on the isolated beach.
Footsteps slowly creaked on every step of the stairs. The bedroom door handle turned slowly.
Death lurked in every doorway with hell at one dark window. Inspired by A. Noyes 'The Highwayman'
My hair stood on end, a shiver raced down my spine and a lump came to my throat. It was him...
The gravestones stood silently, row upon row like soldiers long forgotten, a scream shattered the silence...
It was there and then it had gone, why would a rabbit be on my bathroom floor?
Bleary-eyed, I went downstairs for breakfast, the house was empty, even the furniture had gone...
The lights flickered and then went off, then the sirens started, it was coming, we knew it wouldn’t be the last time...
The date was 13th July, my 345th birthday... it would be my last...
Three of us. We were the only ones left, the only ones to make it to the island
"What have you done?" the headmaster bellowed, all eyes now turned to me as he stood over the lifeless body on playground.
Dad just sat and cried. He cried for three whole days. His face was blotchy and his eyes were red. Then one day he just stopped...
The clock stopped... 74 minutes past 18...it was time to get up.
The car screamed to a halt, four men wearing masks jumped out and ran into the nearest building, I looked around. The street was deserted except for me.
Everything stopped, people were stood like statues all around me, people in cars, men on bicycles, babies in prams all lifeless, frozen in time.
I had never seen a ghost. But like they say, there is a first time for everything.
He opened the safe and it had gone. No one had the code, who could have opened it?
Grey and foreboding, the castle stood atop the hill looking down across the small town, in the topmost window of the highest tower stood a small boy called...
Am I in heaven? What happened to me?
Closer and closer it came, it was getting bigger and bigger, soon it filled the sky above, was the moon falling?
He wandered aimlessly through the house seeking any form of distraction to avoid the inevitable doom. Why did it feel like he was nearing the gallows?
Peeking through the window her surprise turned to horror...
I woke up with a start, something was in my room. The wardrobe doors opened and it came out of my wardrobe.
"Witches don't exist!" My gran's words echoed around my head as the horrific visage gurned at me through my bedroom window.
Keeping watch at the side of the ship, George was tiring; his eyes weary from constantly searching the horizon, were they also playing tricks on him? What was that waving from the rocks?
The two coins in his pocket clinked together as he stumbled down the cold pavement, the holes in his shoes turning his feet into blocks of ice. His heart was warmed though in the knowledge that he was rich.
The phone rang. "Hello," I said, "Hello." No one was there. I hung up. All the lights went out...
Wrapped up warm against the icy fingers of dusk, the caretaker closed the cemetery gates, who was that watching him?
Hundreds of eyes peered at me through the darkness in the alley. How many cats where there? Why were they all here together?
I heard the music as I entered the room, but all that was there was a violin, lay there on it's back on the bare floorboards.
It was the day the moon fell.
I couldn't believe a word he told me any more and why had he brought me here?
Cold and wet, tired and exhausted she made her way along the path through the forest.
Everything stopped, everything a statue all around me. Frozen in time.
"Help me!" Help me!" Came the call from behind the steel door.
"Welcome to the future!" said, the teacher as she removed the sheet with a flourish revealing what had been hidden beneath.
My next door neighbours, The Johnsons, were all asleep in their coffins when I climbed the fence to get the ball.
It moved, why was it moving? That should not have been moving, well not on it's own anyway.
I hadn't seen the door before. It wasn't there last night. Cautiously, I turned the handle.
She scratched his face from the photograph. She would get her revenge.
It was a bright, frosty morning. The pavement glistened like a carpet of crushed diamonds in the early morning sunshine. by Debbie Reynolds
As she walked along the street the tiny dragon in her pocket stirred restlessly. By Dot Hallam
Just after he died, he sat up.
His metal mask shone in the sunlight, he prayed that this would not be his last day.
'I pushed open the old creaky door and looked inside. What a sight met my eyes!'
It was spring 2014 when I first realized I could breathe under water.
A Short Story Should Include...
setting details woven into the text
development of at least one character through the character’s words, thoughts, and actions and through the words of other characters and/or the writer
a problem/conflict which is developed as the story
(plot) progresses
a resolution of that problem/conflict (climax)
a conclusion (what happens after climax)
snapshots/imagery (things for the reader to visualize)