: Re: Do I need to start off my book by describing the character's "normal world"? I know a lot of books do it (Harry Potter, LOTR, Wheel of Time). It's even part of the "Hero's Journey". However,

@Dunderdale623

Vote Up Vote Down

In a story that isn't set in our normal here-and-now, be it fantasy, science fiction, historic fiction, or something else, you need to establish what's normal for your setting, and what isn't. As an example: aliens land in the local spaceport - is it an "inciting incident", or are they just regular traders? Or is landing of aliens in general commonplace, but those particular aliens are a surprise?

For your reader to understand what's "out of the ordinary", they need to understand what is "ordinary".

In the absence of evidence to the contrary, readers will assume "our normal world". @MatthewBrown mentions Hamlet as an example: indeed, we know what court is, and what court politics are. Thus, the opening scene quickly establishes "we are at court", and moves on with the story. Ghosts, we are told, are not normal. But the inciting incident is not "the ghost appearing", but "the ghost talking to Hamlet", which doesn't happen until we've been introduced to Hamlet's "normal" at Claudius's court.

Game of Thrones starts in a similar manner: in a quick prologue it is established both that the Wall is normal, and that the Others are not. (Note that in this case, this is not the inciting incident - the inciting incident is King Robert coming to Winterfell.)

The more your setting differs from our "normal", the more you would have to establish right from the start. But then, the very fact that it is all different makes the reading interesting (providing your writing isn't boring). You thus have some leeway for a longer "beginning". As an example, nothing much happens in the first chapter of The Lord of the Rings - "The Long-Expected Party". But there are hobbits, and there's Gandalf, and there are hints of other things, so that makes it interesting enough.

All the same, starting with "normal" doesn't necessarily mean starting with boring getting-up, brushing-teeth. As an example, Jim Butcher's sixth novel of the Dresden Files series, called Blood Rites starts

The building was on fire, and it wasn't my fault.
My boots slipped and slid on the tile floor as I sprinted around a corner and toward the exit doors to the abandoned school building on the southwest edge of Chicagoland. Distant streetlights provided the only light in the dusty hall, and left huge swaths of blackness crouching in the old classroom doors.
[...]
I checked behind me.
The guardian demons looked like demented purple chimpanzees, except for the raven-black wings sprouting from their shoulders. There were three of them that had escaped my carefully crafted paralysis spell, and they were hot on my tail, bounding down the halls in long leaps assisted by their black feathered wings.

In this case, the fast-paced chase scene establishes the "normal": the location is urban-fantasy Chicago, the protagonist can cast spells, and monkey-demons throwing flaming poop are not a surprise for him.

For your setting, what is normal, and what isn't? Your character is going to school - that, supposedly, is normal? Or is it that for some reason your character wasn't expecting to be going to school?

Buffy starts with Buffy going to school (actually it starts with establishing the existing of vampires preying on students, but then it starts with Buffy going to school). Then there's a vampire-eaten corpse in a locker. There's a clear delineation: there's "normal", there's "weird for most of the world, normal for Buffy", and there's "so weird, it's weird even for Buffy".

(0)

Login to post a comment!