Chapter 1

it's 6 am and John's alarm clock goes off. He groans and shuffles in the bed, opening one eye to peer at the time before snapping it shut again. "5 more minutes," he says and slaps the snooze button before rolling over.

John was never a morning person; he got this job from his father. He was the vice president at the National Bank and had gotten John a job as a teller with promises of promotions if he did a good job. That had been two years ago.

The familiar tingling of needing to pee signalled to John it was time to get up.

...

Ok, that's enough of that - this probably sounds at least loosely familiar to many of you. It's the commonplace many writers reach for when they start their stories. It makes sense: you want to introduce your character, set the stage for who they are and what they do, and give the reader a sense of what an ordinary day is like for them.

The trouble with that is, it's also incredibly boring.

Your readers likely have average lives, working in various jobs with aspirations for promotions just like John here, and while that makes John relatable, it also makes him routine. Your readers want to experience something they can't in their normal lives. They want to escape.

Here's the thing: you might have a really interesting story coming up, maybe John has been embezzling funds from the bank to fund a gambling addiction, and the reader just needs to get to that scene for the pay-off. Then start the scene there, don't make them sit through John having breakfast, brushing his teeth, tying a Windsor in his tie (cause that's how his Dad taught him years before). These details can be sprinkled in later through dialogue (imagine his dad meeting him at court and redoing his tie for him before his arraignment), and some details may not even make the final draft.

So, where should you start your scene?

How about this?

Chapter 1

John checked his watch and tapped his foot while he waited for a gap in traffic. He was running late as always. As he burst through the doors to the bank, he hurriedly tapped his card on the fob, but instead of lighting up green, it kept showing red over and over. "Come on, not now, I'm already late," he muttered.

"That won't be necessary, John," a voice came from behind him.

He spun around to see his boss standing with the head of HR, and a security guard.

...

Now that's action. What's going to happen to John? It's pretty clear to the reader that he's being terminated. But the security guard and HR? Is this something worse? The reader is practically forced to read on and find out what happened next.

This concept of starting with action is known as "In Medias Res", a Latin phrase that means "into the middle of things". It's a commonly used idea in writing, especially in fiction, where you drop the reader into the middle of the action and let them catch up to what is going on.

While it might be interesting to give a detailed exposition about him, we don't need to know John before we care about him; we just need to see him in trouble. The backstory fills in naturally as we root for him.

Go back to your first chapter and read your first sentence. Does it capture your imagination or just present backstory? A reader browsing in a bookstore gives your opening page seconds before deciding to move on. Make those seconds count.

And remember the difference between a dreamer and an author is the tap of the keys, or the stroke of the pen.