How To Write Killer Opening Lines: 6 Principles the Best Writers Know
Don’t open with boring descriptions, drop us right into the story
If writing is war, composing your first line is the handcuffed escape from the enemy’s prison. Do it right, and it’s likely your story will be told for ages.
Do it wrong —and you’re dead.
First, understand this: you’re right to be concerned about your first line. It’s the door every potential reader will walk through to reach your treasured ideas. Although not every one of these principles will need to show up in every first line, at least one should show up in all of them.
I worked in sports and news journalism for five years. During that time, if someone wrote a 1,000-word post, they spent 20% of their time writing 982 words, and then the group would collectively spend the other 80% trying to craft the perfect headline, subhead, and first line. It’s that important.
These first sentence principles apply to all genres. You can use them across fiction or nonfiction, novels or blog posts. Whether you’re a seasoned professional looking to spill out your wealth of knowledge into a book, or a young fantasist ready to create your worlds, this post is going to help.
Principle #1 — Give People a Reason to Read the Second Line
“When Boris Johnson made his way to Buckingham Palace yesterday to inform the queen of England that he would form a government, the world’s media did not mince words in its assessment of the new prime minister of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.”
This is far and away the most important principle in first-line writing. It’s sometimes helpful to think about your first sentence as a cliffhanger for the next sentence. How can you set up an opening line that’s interesting enough to intrigue me, yet incomplete enough to keep me hanging on?
The best writers do this so well that it’s almost unnoticeable. You can see how Danny cleanly slides this phrase into the middle of his premier line:
“The world’s media did not mince words.”
What did people say? Which countries were the angriest? If you’re not familiar with Boris (like me), you want to know: what kind of person deserves the ire of “the world’s media?” None of these questions are answered in this first sentence. They don’t have to be.
For comparison, here’s a less impressive way to convey the same information:
“Boris Johnson won the election yesterday and newspapers gave him bad reviews.”
This second version is miserable, but why? Notice the first line pulls everyone in, but the second one requires readers to be prequalified. You’d need to know who Boris Johnson is. You’d have to know which election is “the election.” You’d also probably want to know which “people” are saying mean things. All of these mental gymnastics are required to get past the very first line.
Principle #2 — Use Power Words
“I wanted to see women naked.”
— I WANTED TO SPY ON WOMEN GETTING UNDRESSED SO I JOINED A CULT, James Altucher
Altucher is king of what I’m tentatively calling the smash-you-in-the-face hook. When you read one of his opening sentences, you immediately know (or think) you’re going to be reading something scandalous (or at least entertaining). In the first lines of Altucher’s last 10 blog posts, I found these phrases:
- “see women naked” (again)
- “too worthless”
- “cheated on their spouse”
- “between marriages”
- “got depressed because my dad went broke”
- “I joined a cult”
- “I was chased”
When Altucher writes, you’re hard-pressed to look away. The reason? His paragraphs are charged with power words.
What’s a power word? And why do they work? Here’s a definition from Jon Morrow and the team over at SmartBlogger:
“Power Words are persuasive, emotional words that trigger a positive or negative response.”
Many people think their topics are too boring to add power words, that doing so would feel forced or unnecessary. However, all topics can be made interesting. Take a look at those phrases from James Altucher once more. What do you think those posts are about? Relationships, right?
Nope:
- Entrepreneurship
- Bitcoin
- Hitchhiking
- Business and Money
- Investing
Your job as a writer is not to simply relay information. It’s to package information with emotion so that your readers can digest the facts on a human level. When you’re a good writer, your first line can be anything. So long as it’s analogous to your topic, you can bring your readers back to drive home the point.
Principle #3 —Write to Your Audience
“As a woman on the internet — and, more to the point, as a woman whose job necessitates keeping her direct messages open for pitches, tips, and chats with potential sources — I’m well acquainted with a certain sort of unsolicited message.”
Let’s take a minute to talk about style, shall we?
This first line is pretty long for an online post, clocking in at 40 words. Moreover, it has an intrusive (albeit sexy) em dash muscling its way in, which makes the reader pause for a moment. Most writing teachers advise against this. Readers are supposed to be mentally pausing each time they see a parenthetical.
Would I call this a great first line? Honestly — no, I wouldn’t.
So why is it included in this post?
- Because the headline alone is enough to earn recognition.
- Because it’s a pointed first line.
Most writing teachers instruct their students to “Write to a 9th-grade level.” Do you see a potential problem writing on a 9th-grade level about solving the dick pic epidemic? Like maybe… the mental age of people sending those pics in the first place?
Alptraum doesn’t need everyone to read this article for a solution to be attempted. She only needs to persuade technical people who have the potential to solve the plight of women who are assaulted by wrinkly penises spilling out of their DMs on a regular basis.
It’s also worth mentioning Alptraum is the author of a book called “Faking It: The Lies Women Tell About Sex — And the Truths They Reveal.” Not only is her opening line here targeted for this article, but it’s also targeted to people who would probably be interested in her entire body of work.
Principle #4 — Set the Story in Motion
“ This is the story of an adventure that happened in Narnia and Calormen and the lands between, in the Golden Age when Peter was High King in Narnia and his brother and his two sisters were King and Queens under him.”
— The Horse and His Boy, C.S. Lewis
When I was a boy, I first adored Lewis’s books for the stories. As an adult (debatable) now, I appreciate them for the simultaneous depth and conciseness of the writing.
Without any apparent effort or flair, “The Horse and His Boy” simply begins. Before you know how it happened, you’re in the story. This is a good reminder: a first line doesn’t have to be epic. It doesn’t have to be intense or thrilling or altogether scandalous.
It does, however, need to get us into the story. There’s a mention of a character. There are some words we don’t know. There are some verbs. The long, plain line works because of the hints that are dropped. We don’t know who Peter is. We don’t know why adventures are happening. We don’t know what the heck “Calormen” is.
But we do want to find out.
Beginners make the mistake of opening their posts or novels with boring, plain descriptions. Masters drop you right into the story.
By the way, this works in nonfiction as well. Enchanted lands aren’t required to set a story in motion. Julia Cameron, the author of “The Artist’s Way” and multiple nonfiction novels, uses this opening line in a post about how simple it can be to start writing:
“I’ll begin at the beginning, with a blank notebook whose pages beg, ‘Fill me.’”
Perfection.
Principle #5 — Use an Unexpected Turn of Phrase
“Mr. and Mrs. Dursley of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.”
— Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, J.K. Rowling
Two quick thoughts about the written world of Harry Potter. One, sorry, Brits, “Sorcerer’s Stone” is just better than “Philosopher’s Stone” because of the juicy alliteration. And two, the voice of the Dursleys is woefully underappreciated.
The end clause here literally makes me weak at the knees. Rowling starts the voice of the narrator by throwing in four words the Dursleys would say themselves. Even before you’ve met her, you can already imagine the propriety of Petunia Dursley’s curt voice:
“Thank you very much.”
An end clause or turn-of-phrase can add a little extra flavor to an otherwise straightforward introduction. You not only start the story here, but you also learn everything you need to know about the Dursleys.
Another example of this doesn’t come from a first line, but nonetheless, it’s one of the most quotable lines in history:
“Here’s looking at you, kid.”
It’s unthinkable to imagine Rick Blaine saying this line in Casablanca without the “kid.” His character, wonderfully played by Humphrey Bogart, sets the bedrock for a person who is not only tough, but also nearly indifferent to the emotions mortals of his world suffer from. Rick says this at the end of a movie to a woman he loves. But his character still demands the “kid” be said.
Principle #6 —Bust a Myth
“To be a successful creator you don’t need millions.”
—1,000 True Fans (rewrite), Kevin Kelly
This first line follows several of the principles mentioned above while adding a new strength to the mix. In this legendary essay by the founding executive editor of Wired magazine, Kelly writes a targeted line — he’s using the second person (you) to speak directly to those who identify as “creators.” He uses a borderline power word — “successful.” He leaves an enormous cliffhanger by saying creators “don’t” need a certain thing, which immediately begs the question, “what do we need?”
What’s really impressive, though, is in nine short words, Kelly challenges the underlying assumption of most artists and creative people: that one must be massive in order to succeed.
This “myth-busting” is largely accepted by speakers and gurus of today’s world as a way in the door. Malcolm Gladwell, Simon Sinek, Gary Vaynerchuk, Brene Brown, and Rachel Hollis have all used this message to ground their respective philosophies:
“You think _______ is true, but you’re wrong.”
Hollis even puts her angle of myth-busting right in the title of her mega-bestseller, “Girl Wash Your Face.” On the cover, she encourages readers to “Stop Believing the Lies About Who You Are so You Can Become Who You Were Meant to Be.” Hollis’s work has gotten plenty of criticism, but the principle of myth-busting shows up clearly. (What’s unclear from the cover is what exactly these lies are…but that seems less significant.)
When in doubt, it doesn’t hurt to bust a myth. Even if there is no “myth” to be busted.
Final Thoughts
To recap, here are the six principles great writers lean on when searching for that elusive opening sentence:
- Give People a Reason to Read the Second Line
- Use Power Words
- Write to Your Audience
- Set the Story in Motion
- Use an Unexpected Turn of Phrase
- Bust a Myth
There’s a final secret I haven’t mentioned yet, but if you’ve been paying attention, you’ve probably picked up on it. You can pick any one of these principles and use it every time to find your writer’s voice. Where Altucher begins with power words, I almost always start in the middle of a story.
Choose one of these that fits your style, go straight to it when you feel stuck, and let your story bleed all over the page.
