Tuesday Tidbit: Spotting major flaws in your memoir’s opening

Here’s your 15 seconds of inspiration,

this week’s Tuesday Tidbit:

Prolific author Cecil Murphey said, “I once read more than one hundred of the entries for Christmas Miracles, a compilation book. The major flaw in at least a third of them was that they told us the ending before they told us the story.”

How are you doing on your memoir’s beginning?

Matilda Butler offers brief but oh-so-practical tips on making your memoir’s opening sparkle. Check out her writing prompts at Now It’s Your Turn.

Related posts :

Excellent resources for your memoir’s opening

Tips for writing a top-notch opening

First lines

Openings: the hardest part

Sharon Lippincott’s tips on writing your opening paragraph

A writing contest over at Women’s Memoirs

First Paragraph contest winners

Silver Award winners

Tuesday Tidbit: First Paragraph contest winners

Here’s today’s Tuesday Tidbit,

your 15 seconds of inspiration:

Do you remember the First Paragraph contest over at Women’s Memoirs? Pamela Jane Bell, Kendra Bonnett, and Matilda Butler invited us to submit one paragraph—an opening paragraph—for their contest.

Did you enter the contest? I hope so! I did.

This morning I was pleased to see my entry listed as one of the Silver Winners. (Click on Silver Winners to read it.)

At that link you’ll find a list of the other Silver Winners and their paragraphs, and you’ll see what worked and what didn’t. Studying those entries, and reading Pamela’s feedback, helped me grow as a writer, and you’ll find the reading of them informative, too.

Related posts:

Tips for writing a top-notch opening

First lines

Openings: the hardest part

Sharon Lippincott’s tips on writing your opening paragraph

Tuesday Tidbit: First lines

Here’s your 15 seconds of inspiration

for this week’s Tuesday Tidbit.

If you’re polishing an opening paragraph

for the contest at Women’s Memoirs,

keep this in mind: Openings require a lot of work.

Tips for writing a top-notch opening

Your opening is the most important part to write well—whether you’re penning a book, a vignette, an article, a blog post, or an opening paragraph for the Women’s Memoirs contest. (Did you miss Tuesday’s post? If so, click here. And remember, the contest is open to men, too.)

At the same time, the opening is probably the most difficult part to write well.

Your beginning can make or break your story: An effective opening can entice a person to keep reading—but a weak opening can make a person close the book and walk away.

Before you start working hard to perfect your opening,

chew on this question:

Is your opening the correct opening?

Most of us write our way into stories. We start writing anywhere we can, and that’s fine.  We get down as much as we can, knowing that later we’ll go back and reorganize, edit, rewrite, and polish.

Warming up. Yes, that’s what we’re doing with our first drafts, maybe even with our second and third drafts, too.

Most of us warm up by circling around the heart of our stories. Warming up helps shape our ideas, discover where our story is taking us, and pin down what’s important.

I’m talking about the scaffolding we set up to build our stories.

I first learned about scaffolding years ago from Donald Murray, and later from Roy Peter Clark and Don Fry.  They say:

Chip Scanlan tells how scaffolding in writing resembles scaffolding in construction:

“Scaffolding is the ‘temporary framework of platforms and poles constructed to provide accommodation for workmen and their materials during the erection, repairing, or decoration of a building,’ as the Oxford English Dictionary defines the term.

“In the writing trade,” Scanlan says, “the poles and planks of scaffolding are words, phrases, and sentences that help the writer build.” (Click here to read the rest of his post, Dismantling Your Story’s Scaffolding.)

Whether you’re building a castle or a memoir, the scaffolding must come down.

Look over your WIPs (works in progress) and identify the scaffolding. Those are the sentences that “can’t appear in the final version” (Clark and Fry).

Is it possible that your original opening paragraph is scaffolding?

If so, remove it.

Then, examine your story to determine the best opening. Often the opening—or the idea for your opening—is buried deep within the story.

In most of my writing, I seldom craft the best opening until I’m well into the revision phase.

How about you?

Your assignment this week is to recognize and dismantle your scaffolding. Then begin planning to create the best opening for your piece.

We have lots more to consider

about crafting an outstanding opening.

Be sure to come back next week!

Tuesday Tidbit: A writing contest over at Women’s Memoirs

This week’s 15 seconds of inspiration might take you 30 seconds,

but it’ll be worth your time: Here’s a fun opportunity!

At Women’s Memoirs, Pamela Jane Bell, Kendra Bonnett, and Matilda Butler have announced a contest for both women and men. (If you’re a man and you doubt whether you can enter, read the comments at that link.)

They invite you to submit one paragraph—your opening paragraph—for their current contest. Entries, due September 3, should be around 150 words. Click here to learn more, and be sure to check out those prizes! 

If the thought of entering a contest makes you want to run the opposite direction, click here for a pep talk.

A book’s opening is the most important part to write well: From sentence one, your job is catch your readers’ attention, draw them in, and entice them to keep reading. 

Thursday I’ll share tips on editing, rewriting, and making that paragraph sparkle. For now, look over your manuscripts (you have a number of them in rough draft, right?) and select one to polish for the contest.

Be sure to come back Thursday!