I disagree. You don't avoid the bad argument merely by using 'may.' If I were to speculate as to your ancestry or the inter-relatedness of your parents in an attempt to demonstrate that I had a superior argument about books, I'm sure you would agree that it would be an ad hominem argument even if included words like "may" in my presentation of the argument. Of course, I'm not making that argument. But back to the discussion at hand... This is purely subjective. I've read plenty of classics that I really liked, and I recall that they had interesting beginnings. I can't think offhand of any that I thought were great that did not. Actually I said the opposite. A slow beginning can be interesting. All I've said in this thread is that a book has to be "interesting" from the beginning, not whether it has to be fast or slow. If it isn't interesting from the beginning I'm probably not going to read it, because there are far too many books out there that are interesting from the beginning also demanding to be read.
But it is NOT subjective that they are "widely believed" to be good, which was clearly what he was referring to when he said "great novels". Do you understand why I am asking what you are disagreeing with? All you said was "I disagree", but there was nothing that he said that you could disagree with. Maybe you meant "I disagree with the general view of those novels, I think novels with uninteresting beginnings are bad", but in that case, you should have said that. Fair enough.
I'm afraid that I think that it stands a very, very high risk of being boring. Starting with background, instead of starting with present events, is always a huge risk. Instead of your character idly thinking in class, why not start with him being mid-argument with a professor, or in the middle of some competition with another student? The professor could slyly refer to your character's fall in status, your character could be annoyed at the bovine contentment of his classmates, and so on. But even that's a little too blatantly backgroundish; there could be some undercurrent beneath it that distracts the reader from realizing that you're throwing background at them. Maybe your character is deliberately trying to get himself thrown out of class so that he can do... something, meet someone. Maybe he's distracting the professor so that his one friend in class can do something, play a prank or steal something. So you get surface conflict, and underlying tension and suspense, _and_ your reader fails to notice that you've just handed them a big basket of background information along with all that entertainment. ChickenFreak
When deciding what to pay real money for, I do a "first paragraph test". I know that plenty of fine books have lousy first paragraphs, but there are a lot of books in the world, and I'm trying to narrow my choices. Now, the first paragraph doesn't need gunfire and explosions - _A Murder Is Announced_ by Agatha Christie starts with a newsboy on his bicycle and a long catalogueing of what newspapers various characters subscribe to. And it works. Once I've bought the thing, or checked it out of the library, or otherwise committed to it in some way, I tend to give up just a little before the halfway point if it hasn't made itself worthwhile yet. Yes, this means that if one lousy book is twice as big as another lousy book, I'll read twice as much of the first one. I never claimed to be all that logical. ChickenFreak
I can drop a book anytime it gets to boring. If I am not hooked on it by chapter 2, it probably won't get completed. But if it grabs me and then falls away or apart, I will still drop it. I have not read books for a long time, so I don't mind reading library books. I hate buying books, they take up space and I will probably never read them again.
You should read "The girl with the dragon tattoo" by Stieg Larsson. I read the first 100 books before it got interesting. The main reason why I bothered read all if was because 'everyone' (well, a cute swedish chick) said it was great, and it was the first in a trilogy. I decided that even if the first book sucked, the remaining two could be fun. The first book was only 1/3 of the whole story, so reading an entire book before giving up wasn't so bad. And after those 100 pages, it turned out to be brilliant. To get back on topic, it varies for me. I give up some books annoyingly easily, while I can read others for hours before giving up on them. Many times I read on, hoping the story will be better. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't.
That is one that I started, saw nothing particularly special or interesting about, and set aside. On the other hand, I enjoyed Let the Right One In, which I started reading a few weeks earlier, immediately.
I agree with steerpike on this one; i started reading it too and found nothing interesting about it, but it must have been right before that 100 page mark then I don't know what it is but I usually don't like swedish writers way of writing. I much prefer english/american authors translated into swedish, it gives a totally different effect. I wonder how that is...
I did the same as Steerpike. I had intended to keep going with it because it was a bestseller and everyone was raving about it. But I just couldn't get into it so I stopped. I want to give it another go though. I enjoyed Let the Right One In too. I found it really easy to read.
I started it off completely differently now with the beginning being less of an explanation of the background. I changed a lot of the story and I think it sounds a lot better and interesting now.
This. I have to like the writing style and tone. The story is secondary to me, if I have to suffer through weak writing.
I don't measure the quality of fiction based on whether a lot of stuff happens. You seem to be the one putting the emphasis on action and stuff happening. If you're a published author and you can't get me interested, impressed or curious in the first few pages, what makes me think you do it in a few hundred? And again, keep in mind being interesting, impressive or creating curiosity isn't dependent on how much action one can pack into two pages. That has little to do with anything, really.
I don't ever want the setting explained. I open a book in the hopes of reading a story, not getting a dissertation on a world or biography of a character. What I want is for the story to start. If the story is a story about explaining setting, then no thanks. If the story is a story about a character who stands around thinking about their own history, then no thanks. Setting and history and all the expository stuff is best done in context. The start of a story is tough, because context has to be built. Later in a story, if the context has been built, then it's at times inherent, but not at the start. So, the start is like the test, the first impression. Can this writer start building context. Not explaining things, but building context. Good writers build context by putting characters into a scene and having the world feel alive, real and relevant. Bad writers build context by explaining everything and then hoping the reader has stuck around for the 'real' story to start. I prefer to read good fiction, not bad. Brave New World is how old? Writers need to write for tomorrows market, not for ones decades old. Unless you've got a time machine, then have at it, write in the image of outdated fiction. (And I love Brave New World and appreciate what is timeless in it, but style and technique at times isn't where it's at). (and know I'm late on replies, but wanted to anyhow)
As seen from the responses, classics are usually given more leeway, and rightfully so. I personally assume people are talking contemporary unless otherwise specified, as that's what usually matters to writers on a writing forum trying to become contemporary writers. Ummm, why? Because ignorant writers thing 'start with action' means explode something? You're making the assumption that quick judges of a book are looking for explosions or something. If a writer does that, I almost always put a book down unless the explosion (or anything of the like) seems perfectly in the natural context of the story. I also put books down if the first sentence reads more like a movie teaser/hook than the start of a story. You know the type, where instead of starting with a character in a world, it starts with some overblown saying like "Some say love is like a river, but for others love is more like projective vomit!" Umm, okay, that's great, thanks for the Reader's Digest Quotable Quote, but I'd prefer the story simply start. So, there are many reasons I'll put a book down, but it's a bit much assuming it's because action doesn't explode something, or that being a quick judge is somehow responsible for these poor 'start with action' or 'HOOK the reader' advice that is mistaken by bad writers. Basically, if at the start of a story the story doesn't start, then you've already lost my trust as a reader. You seem [awkwardly] emotional about this... I don't think it has anything to do with "people these days", though I understand the urge for many to find any reason possible to make generational judgements. It's not about whether a writer is 'bad' or not, and seeming defensive about that isn't the point. The point isn't about casting some universal judgement on the worth of an entire writer's career based on a few pages... it's about whether the reader wants to keep reading. Basically, it's not about you, it's about the reader. But yeah, it's probably how those people are ruining everything with their -insert mental illness- because of their -insert modern technology-! Ooorrrrrr, it's just that I don't want to continue reading something I didn't start enjoying, hoping I'll at some point start enjoying it if I continue. And I don't believe some stories just start slow. Some writers, definitely, but most stories simply START, they don't start starting like one can often see writers doing.
