There's a Cello on my Table, by Fiona Lloyd

There’s a cello on my kitchen table…

Well, it worked, didn’t it? A strong opening sentence that drew you in – otherwise, you wouldn’t have read this far. A good first line sparks off all sorts of questions in our heads and makes us want to find out more.

In writing terms, this is known as a hook: something that will grab the reader’s attention and motivate them to keep reading. It’s a concept that’s equally relevant to both fiction and non-fiction, and for short and long pieces. Most writing courses emphasise the importance of having a strong first line (which is probably why they’re often the hardest to get right).

A good first sentence whets our appetite for the rest of the story. It conveys information about the style of the book, but only enough to entice us further in. However, they can also be used to inspire our writing.

A few months ago, our local ACW group had a workshop on short-story writing. Being a practical bunch, we spent part of the day writing our own pieces based on one of three prompts. By far the most popular of these was the one that asked us to write in response to a given first line: Raymond had never liked Blackpool. In our feedback session, we discovered all sorts of bizarre reasons as to why the unfortunate Raymond had taken against Blackpool with such vehemence.

The best thing about this exercise was that it made us ask questions. Who was Raymond? Why did he hate Blackpool so much? Had he had a bad experience there, or was it blind prejudice? Once we started interrogating ourselves, the words flowed.

So may I make a suggestion? Next time your writing feels stuck in a rut, pick a starting sentence and see where it leads. You can make up your own opening line, or borrow one from somewhere else – try looking here for inspiration. 

And for those of you who were wondering about that cello, the answer is I brought it home from work because it needed repairing…but I’m sure you can think of a much better story!

Fiona Lloyd works part-time as a music teacher, and serves on the worship leading team at her local church. She enjoys writing short stories, and is working on her first novel. Fiona self-published a violin tutor book in 2013, and blogs at www.fjlloyd.wordpress.com. She is married with three grown-up children. Fiona is ACW's membership secretary.