12 Clichés To Avoid When Beginning Your Story
Read today's tip from Mary Kole's new book, Writing Irresistible Kidlit. In this excerpt, she shares some examples of common story beginnings that kidlit writers make.
Here are some of the most common openings I see, as they're almost always a rejection:
- Waking Up: Avoid the first moments of the day, especially if your character is being snapped out of a dream.
- School Showcase: A character introducing the requisite best friend and the school bully
- Family Showcase: Introductions of parents, siblings, pets
- Room Tour: A character sitting in her room, thinking, looking over her stuff
- Emo Kid: A character sitting and thinking about all his problems
- Normal No More: A character lamenting how normal, average, and/or lame her life is, which is the writer setting us up for the big change that's about to happen
- Moving Van: A character in the car, driving to his new house, hating every minute of it
- Mirror Catalogue: Looking at oneself and describing one's flaws, usually with a self-deprecating voice
- Summer of Torture: A character lamenting how she has to do something that she doesn't want to do (live in a haunted house, go visit Grandma, work at the nursery) all summer long
- New Kid: A character worrying about being the new kid on his first day of school or wizard training or the vampire academy
- RIP Parents: One or both parental units kicking the bucket suddenly and tragically
- Dystopian Selection: In the dystopian genre, it's the day of choosing jobs, getting selected for something awful, being paired with a soul mate, etc.
These are very common beginnings and all I ask is that, if you choose to forge ahead and brave one, make it fresh.
