Writing a Great Hook

"I write this sitting in the kitchen sink."
(Dodie Smith in I Capture the Castle)

You know it when you read one.

"It was a pleasure to burn."
(Ray Bradbury in Fahrenheit 451)

Your eyelids raise. 

Your mind brightens. 

Your lips form "Wow." 

You get giddy.

"In the beginning, sometimes I left messages in the street."
(David Markson in Wittgenstein's Mistress)

You're hooked.

"Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins."
(Vladimir Nabokov in Lolita) 

And it all happened within a breath of a few words.

How do you write an opening that hooks the reader 

and nails her to her seat?

We're about to find out!

At the end of this month, I will be hosting the Hooked on Hooks event, where writers can link up on my blog with their own hooks for their Works-In-Progress, so we can comment and critique the hooks. In perspiration preparation for this event, made possible through Rach Writes Third Platform-Building Campaign, I decided to try and stitch together the key points of a great hook based on what I've learned from some amazing authors.

Writing a Great Hook

Ann Whitford Paul

Author of Writing Picture Books

(Click HERE for a detailed interview with Ann on writing!)

Dive Into Your Story with the 6 W's:

Who is the main character

What is the problem, goal, or conflict

When does the story occur

Where is it taking place

What is the tone of the story

WOW! the reader with the opening line

8 Ways to Create a WOW! with the First Line:

Time

Mood

Setting

Opinion

Provocative Statement

Middle of the Action

Conflict

Scrapbook (letter, journal entry, newspaper article)

Les Edgerton

Author of Hooked

(This entire book is about the opening of your WIP,

so I'll only pick out some key points)

First Line Successes:

Give the reader an unexpected response to an event

Give the reader a character who is "cut out of different cloth than Everyman"

Give the reader trouble (either past, present, or future)

Give the reader pleasure, then "drop the forbidden apple into your Garden of Eden"

Give the reader a reason to read the second sentence; provoke the reader's curiosity

Openings to Avoid:

A dream

An alarm clock buzzing

Too little dialogue

Opening with dialogue

James Scott Bell

Author of Plot & Structure

Grab the Reader:

Action

Raw Emotion

Look-Back Hook

Attitude

Prologues

Bond the Reader and Character:

Identify with being a real human being

Sympathy (from jeopardy, hardship, underdog, vulnerability)

Likability

Inner conflict

These authors provide much more detail on the topic of writing hooks,
but the best way to learn is to read and write.
That's what the Hooked on Hooks event is all about!
We're going to write, write, write,
then share and read and comment.
So please come back on Friday September 30th!

Have you written a post about hooks on your blog?
Please leave the URL to that post in my comments!

Helen is in the short story campaign with me,

and recently wrote about... HOOKS! and HOOKS! and more HOOKS!

Three unique and resourceful posts by Helen that all of us will learn from,

so thank you Helen!

If you'd like some examples of great first line sentences, please use the following links:

100 Best First Lines from Novels by American Book Review

The 25 Best Opening Lines in Western Literature

Best Opening Lines in YA Novels

Keep working on your hooks, writers!

And come back on Friday September 30th to link your "hook" post to my linky Hooked on Hooks!

The Chaos of Infinity

A friend of mine in high school once asked me, "Do you think the raindrops are hitting your windshield at random or is it all just chaos?"

I sat behind the wheel, stunned into silence, and my only (humble) thought was "wow, this guy is not only good looking but a thinker!" Seconds ticked by, I smiled and said something like "I dunno," and realized that I was outmatched.

He went on to be the valedictorian of our graduating class and I have never seen him since.

That one question is the only question I remember from that period of time in my life. Who remembers any questions from when we were in high school? But my friend Steve's question has stuck with me. And it remains unanswered in my mind.

Chaos - any state of confusion or disorder, lacking predictability

Random - having no aim or purpose yet having a number of possible outcomes



It's Mom's Morning Out at the preschool, so my two girls are there. I came home to enjoy my freedom by mowing the lawn, walking the puppy, cleaning the toilet and shower, and now here I sit, blogging before I get to work on a short story.

I watched the water go down the shower floor drain and Steve's question came to mind. Is it all just chaos?

I believe the reason I think of Steve's question over and over for the past 15 years is because it can be expanded to everything in life.

If the libraries cease to exist, where do all the books go? Are the out-of-print words to just disappear at random or will it be chaos?

My children embarking in the world... will my parenting be pulled up at random moments in their life or will they recall things in chaotic fashion?

Is unconditional love purely random or is it infinite chaos?

If heaven stretches on for infinity, are souls wandering at random or in chaos?

Will my children catch raindrops on their tongues at random or is it all just chaos?

I wish I could ask Steve my questions. I imagine he went on to discover the answer to the one he asked me oh so long ago.

The Write Kind of Magic

I recently came across a very good question: How do you let the world in without letting all of the magic seep out?

Writer-mama Jen asked this question in a post on her blog TuTu's Bliss with a beautiful photo to accompany it.

As writer-mamas do we ask ourselves this question when we sit down to write or to read a book to a child?

Sometimes I pick up a book my 2 year old has checked out from the library and I'm baffled, no frustrated, that it sends the message to my daughter to be domestic, to please others is her mission in life, to fit the 'female' role pre-determined for her by society. We need more books referenced here.

When I pick up my pen to write I have to make a conscious effort to make my characters become their own selves, not people forming to the 'norm' set by society and my own biases. Thinking outside of the box when it comes to writing is one way to help our children, our readers, keep the magic within them, to hold on to their innocence for as long as possible, even as the world comes pouring in.

What do you do as a writer and/or a mother to keep the magic alive within your child as the embark in the big wide world alone?

Writers Write and Think Outside the Box: Wall Six - The Open Window

Thank you to everyone who has followed along in this series on writing and thinking outside the box! I appreciate all the comments and ideas that I have received from it. In this final part of the series I like to think that it isn't a sixth wall or side of the box that we'll be discussing, but instead a window that we can keep open so that we can get outside of our boxes.


It is fairly easy to let ourselves hunker down inside our boxes, keeping the sixth side closed, so how do we keep the window open? How can we continue to think and write outside of the box? I know it's corny, but I put my 19-month-old daughter's little Jack-in-the-box beside me on the desk as I think about this question. All it needs is a little jingle to pop open, but for some reason my brain requires a bit more than that.


This is what I know...

• My daughter's brain is constantly in the creative-drive with original thought flowing out of it all the time.
• Every object, every word, every motion presents a new discovery to her.
• My peaks in creativity, when it's almost effortless to think outside the box, occur when my brain is working hard at doing the things I described in Wall Three of this series.

My conclusion: To keep the box open, to continue thinking and writing outside the box, I need to exercise my brain, daily.
Exercises for the Writer-Mama
These exercises are ones that I can pick from on a daily basis to give my brain a kick in the neurons to remind myself to keep my writing original, innovative and creative. Many of these exercises I've gathered from other writers and thinkers I know or have read about. A special thanks to them!

1. Read, Read, Read. And not just books we're comfortable with, but new genres, new age groups, new authors. And think, think, think about what I am reading. One approach for this exercise is described by Jen Roland who has set a reading challenge for herself.
2. Explore different niches. To perfect my craft I try to write in areas that I know, but as a writer wanting to live outside the box I need to try out different niches that writers put themselves into. Maria Schneider calls it "boxing yourself" and she does a great job of broadening her niche. I believe this improves our writing overall as it helps us to develop different writing styles and to learn from others in each niche.
3. Utilize the lists. Other than my grocery list and 'to do' list, my lists are personal and have the vulnerability of first drafts. Mary Jo Campbell's exercise of creating a list of our fears that we will overcome and actually crossing off items on it is a perfect example of how a list can help us to actively seek life outside of the box. To continue this awareness, she suggests generating a list of 100 items that make us come alive so that we can surround ourselves with these things daily.
4. Try on new words. Poet Susan G. Wooldridge utilizes an exercise in creating a word pool for a daily swim. In her book poemcrazy, Susan describes collecting words and attaching them to objects around the house to give new meaning to both the words and objects. Take this exercise one step further and create connections between the objects with their new words or try using the word-object combination in your writing.
5. Blog. My blog has come a long way for me personally. When I began my blog I used it as a springboard into writing. As a new mom with a colicky newborn I was usually very exhausted when a free moment to write landed in my lap. Blogging helped me to just get my fingertips on the keyboard. But recently my blog has taken on new meaning for me. I see it as a challenge for me to climb. It forces me to think about new topics, new directions, and new ideas.

On that note, I would like to ask my readers what other exercises you do to help you think and write outside of the box. How do you manage to keep your creativity going when you write? What do you do to push original thought out onto paper? Writer-mamas aren't the only ones who feel the creativity seeping out of them from exhaustion. Every writer, every thinker can feel this way when he or she settles in to write. But we don't want to settle into the box, so let's keep the window open!

Writers Write and Think Outside the Box: Wall Five

In the last four parts of this series, I have attempted to describe how we can think outside the box. As a writer, I also have to be able to work my thoughts out on paper in a way that shows I am writing outside the box as well. For the past two years I’ve been working on a young adult novel that is currently undergoing a major change, because after separating myself from it I realized that the book’s plot, characters, and settings are boxed into traditional themes. It could pass for many other young adult novels out on the market (if it was even chosen to be published) that I read once and barely think about again.

So how exactly can I get it to a point where it is written outside the box? What can I do to make it become a book that will be treasured?

The Market – The advice of writing mentors to research the current market means more than simply reading a lot of books in the same genre as the one you are interested in writing. At first I simply read a lot of books, mostly award-winning young adult novels, and wrote down brief information about them. The next step involved looking at the young adult market as a whole and determining what areas were lacking and in need of a novel. Finally, I have chosen a handful of books that stand out for me in an exceptional way and I am rereading them a second and third time. Each time I read them I am actually studying them. What makes their plot so successful? How did the author create such a unique voice? How did the author achieve thinking and writing outside the box?

The Foundation – I am currently in this stage in the development of my book. With an understanding of where I would like to take my book, I have begun building the basic framework of it. My notebook is filled with pages of descriptions about the characters, settings, voices, plots, etc; however, what is different this time is that I am trying out new characters, placing them in new settings, and using new plots.

New Characters – This is one of the key parts of my attempt to write outside the box. In the past, my characters have all reflected a lot of who I am or others closely connected to me. Thus, they have been written in a box and live inside the box in my stories. To write outside the box, I have to become an actor in a way, because it is more than stepping into someone else’s shoes as I have described in the earlier parts in this series.

New Settings – My settings generally are painted in places I have lived most of my life in colors that are seen typically in books. I’ve been trying out two new things as I begin working on my book: placing characters in settings that are not the ones I feel most comfortable in and using different types of words to describe them. This has helped me feel new emotions and think more about the interaction between the setting and the character.

New Plots– I have always been more comfortable writing a story’s plot that fairly reflects an experience I had, because this is what I know and my writing should therefore be at its best when writing about it. But thinking and writing outside the box require us to go beyond this idea to a new level of perspective. The biggest component of this transition is imagination. I have to give myself more quality time to think about the plot, both major and minor. It has to happen in my mind with enough time and space that it can move forward in different directions. My past writings demonstrate plots that were shallow and ordinary. Now I am trying to push myself beyond my comfort zone to work towards thinking and writing plots that are original.

The Book – I am getting closer to understanding enough about my characters, settings, and plots that I feel ready to begin creating the outline and writing the book. But I am concerned that I may slip back into a style of writing that in the past lacks originality. What can I do to maintain this new perspective? How can I keep the box open? In the sixth and final part of this series I will try to answer this question.

Writers Write and Think Outside the Box: Wall Four

Day four of this series on thinking outside the box is focused on the construction of our own individual boxes. By identifying and understanding the walls of my box I hope to find it easier to think outside of the box.

Identify Your Box

What are your hidden assumptions? How do these assumptions impact your ability to think outside the box? Where did these assumptions originate from? How can I break down the walls of my box?

Step One: Make a List of Your Assumptions
Here are some of my personal assumptions that I've come up with:

1. I can only best tackle a problem as a visual learner.
2. I too often take for granted my health and blessed life.
3. My opinions are typically influenced by my upbringing, my political beliefs, and my religious/spiritual beliefs.
4. Lately I assume too often that the Internet will provide faster, more correct answers than a human being I could communicate with instead.
5. A solution to a problem may work for a slightly different problem and I could obtain the same results.
6. My behavior is greatly influenced by society and cultures.
7. I assume others think and feel the same as me in a given situation.

Step Two: Think About Your Assumptions and Their Origin

• My experiences in life provide a foundation that I seek comfort in when faced with a question or problem.
• I use knowledge gained from my experiences because it is what I know best.
• There is comfort in knowing that if I go with what I know and not stick my neck out, then I will end up with a solution that works for me.

Step Three: Tackle Your Assumptions to Move Outside of the Box

1. Expanded Listening - If I listen without forming an opinion or an idea while the person is speaking, then I can try give myself time to question what is being said by making a mental effort to put aside my assumptions. Instead of giving a reply that begins with "well, I think that..." I should ask the person to expand on what they are saying so I can truly figure out what it is they are saying.
2. Time for Pretend Play - As often as I try to step into someone else's shoes to assess how they might feel or think about something, I probably do it with the walls of my box surrounding me. If I give myself time to try on the cap of many different individuals including the one in focus, then maybe I can gain perspectives (and answers or ideas) that each person might give. How might a teacher, cab driver, postal worker, lawyer, prisoner, homemaker, welfare-dependent, doctor, PeaceCorps volunteer, etc all feel about a given topic? What advice would they give me?
3. Emphasis on Diversity - Given that society, cultures, religions, organizations, and my past all provide the bricks and cement for my walls of assumptions, I should make a mental effort to encompass a wider range of these when I think. Visualize different people in different settings in different time periods. Listen to voices of not just humans but all organisms. Welcome diversity as a resource that will enrich my mind to help me think outside of the box.

Writers Write and Think Outside the Box: Wall Three

Where Does Creativity Spring From?

The experience of observing and interacting with my daughter from conception to her current age of 19 months has been a major learning experience in my life. I've been thinking about this question over the weekend and watching my daughter do new things that are very creative. With such a young brain, Ayla is discovering new words, new actions, new everything each day. Thus, creativity springs from our human nature, our minds and our imagination. As adults, perhaps the challenge lies in the question "How can we be more creative?"

How to Ignite that Spark of Creativity?

PLAY - Imagination is something we haven't forgotten how to do as adults. Our minds may wander into realms of fantasy, dreams, and fears during the day and night. But do we actually give ourselves time to slip into this world of imagine? Do we have time to play?

My daughter plays all day long, and she prefers it if I play right alongside her. As she plays with her toys and books, investigates the construction of things, manipulates objects to do new things, I am learning how to play again. I invent dialogue between a carrot and an eggplant. I sing to her stuffed animal shark from the perspective of her stuffed animal puppy. I discover how water pours out of different objects into a tub.

As writers we can play with words. Collect unusual words from field guides, cookbooks, magazines, snaps of conversation you pass by, and find new ways to use these words. Read poetry that plays with words in ways that novels don't. Catch a phrase of a conversation between two people you may pass on the street and play with the words in your mind to give them new meaning.

CREATIVE CRAFT - Writers are very artistic and often have many creative outlets, but we may not give ourselves time to pursue these outlets if our time to write is limited. If we do make time, however, to paint a piece of pottery, doodle, listen and only listen to music, try out new recipes, or spend an afternoon with a camera, then we our helping our writing minds to expand.

TOOLS - We have at our fingertips a wealth of tools that make our day-to-day tasks easier. Whether it is browsing googles database for an answer or going to store to purchase an item to simplify a task, we don't have to work as hard to accomplish certain projects. By limiting the tools we let ourselves use, our minds will have to work harder to solve a problem. A simple example is baking a cake: Should I buy a pre-made cake at the store, bake one using a box mix, or bake a cake from scratch? And carry it one step further, bake a cake from scratch without a recipe.

If I steer away from the computer (and access to the Internet) and stick to a piece of paper and a pen, my writing takes on a very different course, one that is independent of quick answers on the web, one that reflects my thinking in its entirety. As writers, we may find our writing to be more creative if we limit our tools to the pen and paper (or a typewriter).

BRAINSTORM - All of these options give our brain a work out. By exercising the mind we may help ourselves to see new things in areas we didn't before. As a writer-mama I love lists: To Do lists, character traits lists, setting description lists, shopping lists, Ayla's words and actions lists, etc. Lists are a first step in brainstorming to help our brain think outside the box. A second way to brainstorm is to make diagrams. How does one word or object relate to another? What is the cause-effect relationship? What detours might a character take? What's real and surreal? Brainstorming is like another form of doodling. It gives the brain space and time to let ideas flow in a stream of imagination.

VIEWPOINT REVERSAL - It is easy to let ourselves fall into the position that we normally take in any discussion or argument. A conscious mind may make an effort to slip into the shoes of the other side, but we still hold firmly to our viewpoint. How often to we make a true effort to switch our perspective? To cast away our assumptions that we make before an opinion is made? This is how we build our box, based on the assumptions we make. What are the assumptions you make every day of your life that lead your mind into making decisions, forming opinions, and solving problems? This question will be the focus of the fourth part of this series.

Writers Write and Think Outside the Box: Wall Two

Taking the time to think about an idea is the first step towards thinking outside of the box. For the writer, we hope to carry this thinking with us as we begin to write so that our writing reflects a higher level of thinking full of creativity and originality. So how do we keep thinking outside the box while we write? Where does creativity spring from?

The Physical Act of Writing

A mentor in grad school once told me that she writes every single manuscript for science journals using the old-fashioned style, using a quill pen and ink pot. And this was set in a wet tropical rain forest where the pages of my books never dried out entirely. She believed that if a writer writes slowly, then it gives the brain time to think about each word before it is put down on paper. In the time it has taken me to write this short paragraph on my computer using a keyboard, I imagine my mentor would have written three or four words. And if someone asked each of us to recite what we’ve written word for word, idea for idea, there would be only one of us who could do it and do it knowing what word would come next and why.

Time is a limiting factor for many writer-mamas. Waking at 5a.m. to write for an hour, jumping into my writing chair at the start of nap time and writing for an hour, and writing or reading for an hour from 9 to 10p.m. is the most I ever get in a day to work as a writer. Some days I get a lot less and I miss it. To make up for the short amount of time I have, I use my computer to write. When starting a new project, I do write in a notebook using a regular ball-point pen to get my creative juices and new voice flowing into the project. But once the ball gets rolling, I transition to my computer so I can write faster.

Is this wrong? Would I be better off writing with a quill pen and ink pot? As an artist, the idea interests me, because I enjoy the feel of ink and paint flowing from the tip of a brush. As a writer, the idea makes me wonder if I could become a better writer by taking the time to think about each word I put down on paper. Perhaps it is time to go to the store and find myself a bottle of ink and a quill pen? But my daughter has just woken up and it isn’t even 6a.m. yet. Maybe she and I will go on an adventure today to the office supply store though!

So Monday's part in this series will focus on the question: Where does creativity spring from? (We're going to see Ayla's grandparents and great-grandmother in PA this weekend!)

Writers Write and Think Outside the Box: Wall One

To kick start this series on “Writers Write and Think Outside the Box” I want to state the reason for it: I struggle to write and think outside the box, so I am hoping this exercise will help me learn how to do it better!

When I was in the process of applying to many graduate schools for their doctoral programs in biology I found myself with a few extra recommendation letters from a particular advisor I had while working as a naturalist in a foreign country. Naturally, I opened the letter to read what she had written about me. Although there were many positive comments in her letter, one statement she made has stuck with me over the past 10 years: “Kimberly is not original.” My first reaction: “What? Of course I am original. I’m unique. I’m creative.” But as the statement began to seek in I felt it pushing to the surface a deeply buried fear of mine that I am not original, that my mind can stretch only so far, that I struggle as an analytical thinker, and that I am boxed in.

Two years later I accepted this statement as truth when I failed my doctoral candidacy exam at the university. The professors suggested that if perhaps I earned my masters degree first, then I would have the foundational knowledge to help me proceed with a Ph.D. I disagreed. I was not original and didn’t have the brain to become a doctor (in ecology, evolution, and systematics). Knowing I lacked the confidence to try again, I turned onto the masters track and finished up with this degree, which I am grateful to have for the three years taught me a lot about biology and learning.

Several years later I have begun to wonder if perhaps I can be original in other fields, in particular writing. I remember that in high school and college my paintings were original, and I remember how it felt when I painted. There was freedom, an abandonment of mind, a release into a realm of creativity that poured in an infinite amount. This memory encourages me and gives me hope that perhaps my mind is original in certain ways.

So this series is my attempt to help my mind reach its potential. In so doing, I hope that I may help other writers and thinkers to think outside of the box.

Getting Boxed In

Editors and publishers seek new approaches, unique perspectives, and innovative ideas about concepts and information that flows through our community. Regurgitating information like a news reel simply won’t pass in this competitive market. Writers must write outside of the box to have their voice heard, and voice is a key component of thinking outside the box.

To think outside the box we first must give our minds time to process information and think about it. Let it sink in. Roll it around on your tongue. Let your imagination mold it and shape it into new forms. And most importantly, use your own foundation of knowledge and experiences to digest it. Your mind may find new connections, new meaning to the information, which will help the writer to push forth an entirely new idea written in a unique manner.

This process is easier said than done. It requires us to push our minds in ways that we haven’t done since those early college days when the excitement of learning expanded our brains over night. Our mind’s comfort zone rests in what we know and building on top of what we already do well; however, by experimenting with ideas, trying out new writing styles, reading books we normally pass over, we can gradually push our comfort zone to encompass more. Children are the perfect source to go to for learning how to think outside the box. With their minds expanding daily, we can observe learning in action. As a stay-at-home mom I am fortunate to experience many of my daughter's first moments. I am beginning to think that children live outside the box, and by observing them it helps us to get past all of the assumptions we hold on to in our minds in order to think outside of the box.

In this fast, seemingly chaotic world, it is crucial that we remember to at least give our brains time to slow down to think, think, think about something if we truly want to avoid getting boxed in.

Agenda: Think. Think. Think. Instead of writing this morning I am going to allow my brain to visualize the story I’ve been working on and try to stretch its boundaries with alternative detours to see where it may take me.