A great starter should either 1. Bring interest and questions to the characters and/or events in question, or 2. Establish a setting and tone. Below are a few examples of starts I particularly enjoyed.

~~

Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

TYLER GETS ME a job as a waiter, after that Tyler's pushing a gun in my mouth and saying, the first step to eternal life is you have to die. For a long time though, Tyler and I were best friends. People are always asking, did I know about Tyler Durden.

~~

Christine by Stephen King

Prologue start:

This is the story of a lover’s triangle, I suppose you’d say – Arnie Cunningham, Leigh Cabot and, of course, Christine. But I want you to understand that Christine was there first. She was Arnie’s first lover, and while I wouldn’t presume to say for sure (not from whatever heights of wisdom I’ve attained in my twenty-two years, anyway), I think she was his only true lover. So I call what happened a tragedy.

Chapter 1 start:

“Oh my god!” my friend Arnie Cunningham cried out suddenly.

~~

Fahreheit 451 Ray Bradbury

It was a pleasure to burn.

It was a special pleasure to see things eaten, to see things blackened and changed. With the brass nozzle in his fists, with this great python spitting its venomous kerosene upon the world, the blood pounded in his head, and his hands were the hands of some amazing conductor playing all symphonies of blazing and burning to bring down the tatters and charcoal ruins of history...

~~

Anthem by Ayn Rand.

It is a sin to write this. It is a sin to think words no others think, and put them down upon a paper no others are to see. It is base and evil. It is as if we were speaking alone to no ears but our own. And we know well that there is no transgression blacker than to do or think alone. We have broken the laws. The laws that say that men may not write unless the Council of Vocations bid them so. May we be forgiven!

~~

Choosing by SkItZoFrEaK (http://www.fictionpress.com/s/1575721/1/)

Bill slumped against the heavy metal door, and let it swing out into the chill of the darkening evening. He dragged his feet over the metal door frame, onto the grey cement walkway outside. Behind him, in the gloom, the lobby clerk answered the phone with a high pitched mechanical chime. Bill let the door slam behind him, blocking out her professional, dispassionate voice. The woman was more a machine than a person. She had stared at him with the blank, blind eyes of someone who has acted this scene out too many times. "I'm sorry, I can't help you. Mr. Thompson is busy today. Come back tomorrow."

~~

The Short Happy Life of Francis Mscomber by Earnest Hemingway

It was now lunch time and they were all sitting under the double green fly of the dining tent pretending that nothing had happened.

~~

Any thoughts? Other great beginings you can think of? Reason who the begining isn't important? If yes, then you can stick it up your nose!

Just kidding, reply here!

I have to agree with not starting a story off with the birth of the main character. Frankly, as soon as I read that I assume that this is a prologue that has very little to do with the plot, other than as an opportunity to introduce some very poetic and not-so-mysterious prophecy about the child having some great or terrible power/destiny. Blech. Even if it's not a prophecy, introducing a character at infancy means that you've done nothing to make the reader care about this character, since at this point we know nothing about what sort of person he/she will be.

Although I've seen a few prologues that are rare gems, most of them turn me off because (at least in fantasy) they tend to set the theme of the story towards destiny or some other such nonsense.

Dream sequences and flashbacks are another one that are rarely done well as openings, and even when done well, are rarely necessary and only serve to slow down the plot right away. They also (in my experience) tend to be a sign of poor writing, because it makes me think that the reader isn't capable of introducing this information more subtly throughout the beginning of the story.

Death can be a good way to start a story off depending on the plot, but I agree that parents dying is usually a sign of tons of exessive angst later in the story. Why have the parents die if the MC can't angst horribly about it for five chapters? Blech.

And, hate to say it, "I'm not good enough by a man's standards" makes me automatically think of an uber feminist novel...

Poems are something I rarely bother to read in a story, espically if they're what's starting the story.

From The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (Chapter 1) by Douglas Adams:

The story so far:

In the beginning the Universe was created.

This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.

From Life, the Universe, and Everything by Douglas Adams:

The regular early morning yell of horror was the sound of Arthur Dent waking up and suddenly remembering where he was.

Yeah, poem's that start stories generally are there to either give us the theme for the novel, or to tell us the prophecy or story of the hero we're about to read about... WHY can't you put all of that mixed into the prose and not in a poem at the beginning of the story? I mean... I like a good poem here and there, but starting with one generally bores me.

Girlbrainiac

He stood facing the sea, gripping his spear tightly. His rough, dry hair, and crude brown burlap cloak, both encrusted with sea salt, flapped violently in the billowing wind. He narrowed his eyes to avoid the stinging whips of his hair, and the showers of white, foamy spray caused by crashing waves sweeping over the rocks to his left. He gazed out into the maelstrom and watched intently as the pounding grey mountains of water fought each other, destroyed each other, and then merged with each other. A bright blue flash of lightening lit up the sky, momentarily illuminating the clouds with an eerie ghost-like glow. The flash was soon accompanied by a deep and resonating boom which hurt his ears and conjured up images of ancient sea creatures, thrashing their tentacles as they sang their song to him.

I agree that it is very well written (Stephen King is a genius!), but I think that in general it takes some skill to dive right into the story, but not dive RIGHT in, if you get me. With my stories I'm a sucker for revealing too much too quickly, so I personally avoid openings like that in my work.

Girlbrainiac

Does that grab your interest?

My suggestion would be to use more vivid words in your description, add more details, like the type of car (old and rusted, new and shiny, dirt covered...), whether it's a smooth or bumpy or winding road... What the plantain trees look like (neat and orderly in a row, or growing wildly?)

Also, use more of the senses. I imagine that you would probably be able to smell the orange trees, or the inside of the car, feel the temperature (hot day, cool air conditioning, high humidity and therefore stickiness), sounds she hears, the tires on gravel, the song on the radio, the hum of the engine, her mother on a cell phone, rustling of leaves, roar of wind... The possibilities are endless. It's your story. You decide what we hear, see, smell, feel, taste...

As I said, though, good start.

Girlbrainiac

Gah. Went on a bit of a... lecture there.

I worke so hard trying to get a half decent opening sentence and paragraph for my story! I can't write anything until I've got a first line, so it was a great relief when something came to me for this. Not sure how gripping it actually is though. Tell!

"Kali tried to pry her fingers from the dead woman’s still-cold hand. She was not sure when the nun had died, but there was an absence through the room now, as if all the candles had been softened, one-by-one, until darkness at last became conceivable. Once, Kali had been told that death was like the sunset; no one could pinpoint the moment when the life slipped under the horizon, but the times before were glorious, and those afterwards dark. She looked about, but the room was completely empty and no sound indicated that anyone was coming. No one, then, had seen her sleeping during the Vigil. Standing to brush the dust from her dress, she took one last look at the dead nun. It seemed sad that the old woman should have died without a name and hidden by the ecclesiastical mask worn by all of the ordained holy men and women of Kali’s people, the White Faces. With another surreptitious look around the sparse room, as though someone could have entered unnoticed as she made her final appraisal of the body, Kali leaned over the dead woman and lifted the wooden mask."

I disagree, LOF. "Glass of the car window" establishes that she is in a car with her head pressed against the glass. What you're saying about shortening the first sentence is merely a matter of opinion, though, of course, everyone is entitled to theirs. I believe that first sentences or paragraphs should either establish a mood, a character, a setting, or a theme. In this case, it establishes a setting, though it does a bit to say one or two things about a character. That is what makes it effective.

Now onto the one you're working on :D.

"Until darkness at last became conceivable..." sounds like a rather odd thing to say, almost paradoxical in a sense. Darkness, by it's nature, conceals and obscures. That you percieve the darkness is rather odd. What is darkness but an abscence of light? Maybe it's the word 'concievable' that you chose... It isn't strong enough, I think (and I think you meant percievable, not concievable). 'Evident' might be slightly stronger, or, perhaps, 'all encompassing'. Whatever floats your boat.

I like the metaphor of death being like a sunset.

"She looked about, but the room was completely empty and no sound indicated that anyone was coming." Instead of saying that no sound indicated that somone was coming, try shortening it to fit her somewhat nervous mood. "She looked about but the room was empty. She listened. No sound. No one was coming."

On the whole, I liked this one as well. In this case, it works to establish her character. We can tell from this paragraph that she is curious, somewhat irresponsible, and a little nervous about possibly being caught at what she's doing.

My two cents. Hoped it helped, LOF.

Girlbrainiac

(oopsie, missed out the indefinite article O.O)

I couldn't put it any beter terms myself.

Even better, you could make her seem more nervous by opening it with a question: '...Was no one coming? She listened: no sound. She looked about, but the room was empty.' Although Girlbrainiac's suggestion is just as good. Whatever floats your metaphorical boat ;D

"Tom, wait up!" ...Followed by the named character waiting up and the two of them having a rather boring and pointless conversation that is merely meant to serve as exposition. Few people write exposition well in the form of dialogue. If you can't write well that way, don't do it.

And now for another good story starter....

From "The Great Gatsby" by F. Scott Fitzgerald:

In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since.

"Whenever you feel like criticizing any one," he told me, "just remember that all the people in this world haven't had the advantages that you've had."

I like it because it sort of establishes the narrator as an outsider, an observer of the unusual and unsavory actions of other people. It gives you a sense of the view from which the whole story unfolds, not from the view of someone completely immersed in the world that surrounds him, but that of a spectator.

Girlbrainiac

What I really like to do is to start with a short, quick attention grabber, like a few paragraphs to a page or two, before switching to the slower pace of life.

For example, one of my stories starts with this:

Sirens were blaring in his ears, flashing lights designed to disorient him sprung to life along the corridors. His legs protested the extra strain being asked of them, his lungs screamed as he drew shallower and shallower breaths. Yet still he ran. He had finally seen his chance, his opening, and he had taken it. He thought of the guard left for dead near room 676. He hadn’t killed the man, he continually reminded himself. He had only meant to prevent the guard from stopping him, but things had gotten out of hand. He allowed a wry smile to cross his face. The higher-ups probably never thought he would use their training against them, against the guard still lying unconscious on the floor where he was left. If he weren’t found soon, he’d surely bleed out. And in the ongoing chaos, no one would notice the one missing guard until it was too late. The howling of dogs dragged him from his reverie and he forcibly ignored the blood on his hands. There would be time to deal with that later, when he was gone from this nightmarish hell. For now he would concentrate on escaping. And when he reached the roof, an unavoidable thrill engulfed him as he leapt from the edge and flew .

The next section launches into phone-messages and daily life of another main character, the person whose POV I'm writing from. I give her a chapter of normalcy to get a rough introduction to the setting of the story and the rules of the universe before throwing the monkey wrench into the works.

"No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. With infinite complacency men went to and fro over this globe about their little affairs, serene in their assurance of their empire over matter. It is possible that the infusoria under the microscope do the same. No one gave a thought to the older worlds of space as sources of human danger, or thought of them only to dismiss the idea of life upon them as impossible or improbable. It is curious to recall some of the mental habits of those departed days. At most terrestrial men fancied there might be other men upon Mars, perhaps inferior to themselves and ready to welcome a missionary enterprise. Yet across the gulf of space, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us. And early in the twentieth century came the great disillusionment. "

awilla, that is one of my favorite books ever.

here's one from "the Metamorphisis" by Franz Kafka

"when Greggor Samsa woke up one morning from his unsettling dreams, he found himself changed in bed into a monsterous vermin."

when the first sentance of a book says the main character has turned into a bug, i dont care who you are but you want to read on.

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