In her introduction to The Story, Love, Loss and the Lives of Women,
Victoria Hislop writes about choosing the stories for the anthology: ‘If a story did not arouse a strong response in me, then I did not select it. Even if it is elegiac or whimsical, it must stir something deep in the pit of the stomach or make the heart race.’
I agree. For me a good short story has to move me in some way, whether it be to laughter, or tears or to some kind of new awareness or thinking. Good short stories will linger long after they’ve been read. In them we recognise something of ourselves, something universal.
‘When we read and enter into the world of a story with its characters and their lives, as readers we get this moment, as Graham Swift says, when we recognise the familiar but unfamiliar – the “I’ve-been-here-too-territory,” as he calls it, and it’s this sense of identification which he calls the “heartland of fiction, the real destination of story telling.”’ Marian Garvey.
And to get there (as a writer) according to Swift you must be prepared to uproot yourself and involve yourself fully.
Having said that, where to begin? I think the beginning of a short story is crucial, especially when it comes to submission and competitions where editors or judges have many stories to read. Good short stories invite us in from the first sentence, possibly even before that through the title. Titles should be unique if possible, you don’t want your story confused with a hundred others. For this it often works to be specific rather than general, but I hesitate to give examples because there are always good short stories which break any kind of mould or rules. And I don’t thing good short stories spring up out of a writer’s desire to follow rules.
So all I would say when it comes to beginnings is there’s no time for preamble and backstory. Go straight there, invite us in to the world of your character, intrigue us, let us see her in action or hear her voice so that we want to follow her.
Your first few lines have to work hard and be good. They might well be distilled from a longer opening. I remember when I wrote Millie and Bird I wrote at least a page and a half in my notebook before I came to the beginning and then once I’d arrived at the beginning I got rid of the rest (preamble) and then later edited the first few paragraph again and again until they were as word perfect as I could make them.
To begin all you need is your first line and a character preferably with a predicament or in some kind of jeopardy – not necessarily physical – then write and see where it takes you. There will be plenty of time afterwards for making it as good as it can be.
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