Boring Starts... on purpose?

Discussion in 'Plot Development' started by colorthemap, Feb 5, 2012.

  1. Cogito

    Cogito Former Mod, Retired Supporter Contributor

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    Boring is never a good idea, especially in the beginning. You will lose your readership before they have any reason to stick with it. That includes submissions editors.
     
  2. colorthemap

    colorthemap New Member

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    I guess I used the wrong words. What I mean to say is that the events of my story, in the beginning, are mundane. They lack any sort of adventure and only somewhat foreshadow. Now I have no idea if my actual writing style is boring, mundane, or simply bland for two reasons. I wrote the piece too short ago to truly judge and no other human as seen it. I would post the first part here but I don't think I am allowed without posting in the review section.

    But do you think it is okay if the story is bland for a while but the style shows promise? I feel like people would simply put the book down and move on. Thank you for the responses and I will look over the writing for your suggestions.
     
  3. EdFromNY

    EdFromNY Hope to improve with age Supporter Contributor

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    Again, there is no reason for the story to be bland, and doing so would be counterproductive. Your story can and should be interesting, always, even if the usual life of the character you describe is mundane.
     
  4. madhoca

    madhoca Contributor Contributor

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    No.
    And I agree with you.
    So you have to show 'mundane' but make it enthralling in its awesome awfulness.
     
  5. colorthemap

    colorthemap New Member

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    I guess I will just have to with the idea of foreshadow, send it down to hell and back again. Thank you for all the help.
     
  6. digitig

    digitig Contributor Contributor

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    Look at the opening to Garrison Keillor's Lake Wobegon Days. Everything is utterly banal, but it is so banal and treated as so significant I think it's hilarious -- not boring at all. As others have said, what is happening can be boring, but the way you write it shouldn't be.
     
  7. CheddarCheese

    CheddarCheese New Member

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    Hmm. Well I'd say there's a difference between 'mundane' and 'boring'. If read a book that was boring at the beginning, chances are I wouldn't move on. But I've read plenty of books which start in a mundane, everyday life situation. How do they do it? Beats me. I'm relatively new at writing myself. But writing the mundane doesn't have to be boring. You can still get the message of a dull life across without making the story boring.

    Just my two cents.
     
  8. minstrel

    minstrel Leader of the Insquirrelgency Supporter Contributor

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    When you say "bland for a while," how long a while do you mean? How much are you planning to test your reader's patience?

    And I agree with an earlier poster who said that if you drop in hints at the beginning that something exciting will happen later on, you're better off. Foreshadow!

    If your story is boring, and your prose is boring, you'd better be writing comedy. Nothing else will work, I think.
     
  9. Show

    Show Contributor Contributor

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    Everyday life can be quite interesting. I've started with everyday life and I still think it's pretty interesting. You still got your characters, and if they have interesting personalities, that will still be on display in everyday life.
     
  10. Jhunter

    Jhunter Mmm, bacon. Contributor

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    Quentin Tarantino is very good at taking normally boring and mundane things and making them some of the greatest scenes ever.

    With that said, make your prose good and all will be forgiven.
     
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  11. ChickenFreak

    ChickenFreak Contributor Contributor

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    I think that you can depict a bored character, without producing a bored reader.

    The movie _Joe Versus the Volcano_, unless I'm misremembering, starts with a clear depiction of his incredibly dull and dreary life, but the viewer isn't bored. (Why not? I can't remember. It might be worth renting.)

    _Romancing The Stone_, as I recall, starts with an exciting scene from Joan Wilder's novel, and then very quickly cuts to her typing that novel, and her dull life. It maintains viewer interest through humor and, I think, the viewer identifying with the character. (And it also cuts to the exciting kidnapping scene elsewhere in the world, pretty close to the beginning.)

    _The Gazebo_, a murder mystery by Patricia Wentworth, starts out with an adult daughter and her self-absorbed hypochondriac mother. It's clear that the daughter's life is incredibly constricted and dreary; reader interest is maintained through indignation at the mother's bad behavior and the reader's desire for the main character to "win" in any way, even tiny ways.

    _Through The Wall_, same author, starts out with the moment that the main character's life changes, but it nevertheless makes the reader very aware of the hard-working dreariness of her previous life.

    The real action of _The Borrowers_ starts with Arriety being bored and impatient with her life. Reader interest is maintained by the novelty of the situation to the reader, plus the story is introduced _as_ a story, being told to a fascinated child.

    _The Family Vault_ by Charlotte MacLeod does start pretty early with the life-changing events, but it's not that obvious that they're going to be life-changing, and the picture of Sarah Kelling's suffocatingly dull life up to that point is very clear.

    _Matilda_, both book and movie, start out depicting a dreary life. In the movie, interest is maintained with humor and indignation, and the fact that Matilda is incredibly intelligent. But that intelligence doesn't make her life any less depressing. I think that in the book, the exciting (at least child-sized excitement) events ramp up a little bit faster.

    _Charlie and the Chocolate Factory_, the book, clearly depicts the dull, cold, hungry poverty of Charlie's life, a life that is so dreary that his birthday chocolate bar is a substantial expenditure for the family, and has to be stretched out in tiny nibbles.

    _Feast at Midnight_, a movie, does start out with a change in the main character's life, but it nevertheless depicts a sad, lonely existence until the character finds a way to change it. Actually, a sad lonely existence for several characters. But we care so much about the main character that we're not bored.
     
  12. Cogito

    Cogito Former Mod, Retired Supporter Contributor

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    That's an important distinction. You can write about boredom, or drudgery. How could the story of Cinderella begin without it.

    However, a boring opening should be avoided at all cost. Boring scenes, anywhere in a story will come back and bite you, but a boring start is deadly, especially for an unknown writer. An unfamiliar author begins on probation, and if he or she cannot grab the reader's attention right at the start, it's goodbye Charlie.
     
  13. mammamaia

    mammamaia nit-picker-in-chief Contributor

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    that's true... however, a very good writer can open with a description of a boring life that is not written boringly and thus still grip/hook readers and make them have to keep reading to learn more about the character being so described...

    like anything else in writing, the uber-talented can pull off that which is generally not recommended...
     

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