: Re: I want to know if this opening is appropriate for my story or if this is confusing? Night, when words fade and things come alive. The leaves murmured as the cool winter breeze gushed through

@Phylliss352

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You ask whether your opening is appropriate or confusing. An opening can be appropriate because it's confusing! It all depends what you're trying to achieve. See if you can compare how it affects readers with how you wanted it to.

A good opening leaves the reader aware of what they don't know, with a desire to remedy that; and while that's not quite the same thing as confusing the reader, there's some similarity. Many effective openings, such as the first sentence of Nineteen Eighty Four , deliberately make it clear something is "off".

Bear in mind also that an opening is very difficult to get right the first time, but can be changed later to "fit" what comes afterward. Not knowing what happens next, we can only guess at what such revisions would involve. There are one or two changes I'd make to it, but not because it's too confusing, and not because they're problematic for an opening in particular; but even those hinge on what you're trying to achieve. For example, the visibility of the gulp might run counter to the type of narrative you're seeking, while calling two people "the man" might be more opaque than you aimed for; but I can imagine reasons a writer would be doing that purposefully .

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