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Readers are not hooked by outlandish openings. Readers are hooked by character, story, and setting. You can introduce a character, story, or setting in an outlandish way. (See Steinbeck's introduct...
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#4: Attribution notice removed
by
System
·
2020-01-03T20:41:49Z (almost 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/20921 License name: CC BY-SA 3.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#3: Attribution notice added
by
System
·
2019-12-08T05:02:19Z (about 5 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/20921 License name: CC BY-SA 3.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision
by
System
·
2019-12-08T05:02:19Z (about 5 years ago)
Readers are not hooked by outlandish openings. Readers are hooked by character, story, and setting. You can introduce a character, story, or setting in an outlandish way. (See Steinbeck's introduction to Monterey in Cannery Row for an example.) But it will hook or not hook depending on its effectiveness in establishing character, story, or setting, not merely by being outlandish. Cliche only becomes a problem when it becomes a substitute for effective storytelling, when it feels like the author has reached into a bag of stock language because they had not the skill or the patience to think through and thoroughly imagine the scene, the story, the character, or the setting.
#1: Imported from external source
by
System
·
2016-02-14T16:10:53Z (almost 9 years ago)
Original score: 2