Reading time: 2 minutes, 10 seconds
Anne R. Allen points out that when potential buyers check into a book, “. . . All readers want to see that a book looks professional and polished.
“They don’t want to invest time in a book—even if it’s free—unless they feel they’re in competent hands.”
And your competence, or lack of it, will be apparent from the first paragraph and first page so you need to work hard to make them shine.
Craft an opening that catches potential readers’ attention, stirs their emotions, and makes them curious to know more—in other words, an opening that inspires them to plunk down money for your memoir and read it.
Keep this in mind: You’re not on your own in fashioning your memoir’s opening:
- You can get outstanding help from a quality critique group, either in person or online. Such groups are invaluable! Let your critique partners experiment with you on crafting a powerful lead (opening, beginning).
- We here at SM 101 are also here to help.
We’ve already covered the following types of leads—The Quote Lead and
The Scene-setting Lead. (If you missed recent blog posts, click on links below.)
So today let’s continue with more options for creating a powerful start to your memoir:
The Action (or Narrative) Lead: “The dusty earth vibrated and bushes crashed, snapping the silence of the tawny African plain. . . . We caught a blurred glimpse of some creature approaching us, carving a path through the dense thorn scrub brush. Two tick-eating birds flapped frantically off a massive iron-grey back as their resting place lunged out from under them. Now we saw clearly what was heading our way. It was a rhinoceros, one of Africa’s most unpredictable animals.” (Dr. Jon Arensen, Rhino!)
(Jon and I worked together in Africa. Besides being a great storyteller and author, Jon is an anthropologist, linguist, Bible translator, and university professor. Look into Jon’s other books on Amazon.)
The Anecdote Lead: Use a short story to illustrate or personalize your story’s broader topic or main point.
For example, this anecdote kicks off a story about a broad topic, the proliferation of gun violence across America:
“Even before the fireworks launched from the French Quarter’s Jackson Square, 2006 went out with a bang in New Orleans—a handful of them, actually. At 7 p.m. on December 31, several of those bangs felled a 42-year-old man, who was found inside his FEMA trailer with multiple gunshot wounds to the back of his head. At 8:45 p.m., another man was shot several times and left dead on the sidewalk. At 10:12 p.m., a third was killed inside his home.” (The New Math on Crime, by Will Sullivan, U.S. News and World Report, January 15, 2007).
A Statistics Lead, if brief, can effectively catch readers’ attention and persuade them to keep reading.
For example, “Around the world, 925 million people—more than the populations of North America and South America combined—go hungry on a daily basis,” and Guatemala “has the highest percentage of chronically malnourished children in Latin America (the fourth highest in the world). In some areas, chronic malnutrition causes 90 percent of children to suffer.” (World Vision)
Lead-writing can be hard work, even for pros. Like Bill Roorbach said,
“ . . . Most first lines weren’t first till after much revision. . . .”
That means: Give yourself permission to take weeks, or months, or even years to settle on your memoir’s opening.
An effective beginning can motivate a person to buy your book,
but a weak one could persuade him to close your memoir
and walk away.
Next week: More ways to begin your memoir!
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