Hook, Line and Sinker: Story Hooks · 6:11pm May 11th, 2014
What makes a good story hook? This is a good question. But first, what is a story hook? Also, thank you ZodiacSpear for suggesting this one.
A story hook is what's used to get your reader invested past the first few scenes of your story or, in the case of shorter fictions, the first few paragraphs.
A good hook should do several things, all at once, but in order of precedence, let's look at them.
First - The Story Question
A good hook should prompt your reader to ask a compelling question that they can only find the answer to by reading further. Now, this may be another way of describing tension, but I count tension and the story question as two separate, however interrelated, things. The question will not be something that everyone wants to answer, and that's fine. You're never going to write for everyone. This will tie into Concept in a later blog.
Second - Tension
A good hook should introduce tension or a concept that lends tension even if the concept itself is not the source of tension. This is what keeps the reader interested in finding the answer to the question. Without tension, they may as well read a poorly written textbook. Tension comes from many sources and I'll cover that in several later blogs, as tension can come from many, many places, but is primarily character driven. Thus, most of this information will be found in the Character blog, also coming later.
Third - Showing
A good hook should not Tell. A good hook should Show the tension, make the reader think about the question, and, having thought about the question, become invested in finding the answer.
We'll look at some examples, what I consider to be both good and bad, further on down the line. Like... right now.
Bad Hook:
I apologize in advance. This will go against all three of the suggestions I just mentioned.
Fluttershy was in love with Applejack, but she couldn't admit it to herself. When Twilight asks her to attend a part Pinkie is throwing, Fluttershy asks if Applejack will be there.
"I know you're nervous around her, but come on. She won't bite. Pinkie Promise."
"Oh. It's not that."
Like I said, awful. Just awful.
Okay. First off, the damn question has already been answered. In the first sentence. The reader now has no reason to read further. That's the story. Goodnight folks. Arrivederci!
Second, there's no tension. We know what conflict Fluttershy is having. Again, it's in the first sentence.
Third... Oh sweet, sweet Celestia, the telling! The Telling! (That would make an awful movie, by the way.) I must take a shower now. I am le'shame.
Okay. All better now.
Let's try to fix that up. We'll take out the telling because, honestly, that's where 90% of the problem with this hook comes from. So we'll back it up. From number three, up to number one.
"Hi, Fluttershy."
"Oh, Twilight. I didn't hear you coming." she pushes closed her door, cheeks heating.
"So, I was wondering if you'd like to come to an anniversary bash Pinkie is throwing for the founding of Sweet Apple Acres."
"Oh," she pauses, biting her lip, "I-"
"Oh, come on. All of our friends are going to be there. It'll be fun!"
Through her mind drifts an image of a certain blonde maned, orange coated pony. "I don't know..."
Still bland, but we've taken away most of the telling. There's barely a hint of tension, and maybe the start of a question. But, if y'all know me, then you know what the tension is. So... no secrets there.
Alright. Let's see what we can add in to spice things up a bit. If you're here for AppleShy, scroll down several paragraphs. If you're here for explanations, then AppleShy, please continue. If you're here for something not involving AppleShy... Sorry, got nuttin'.
There are several things we can use to invoke a sense of tension in the reader and make them want to answer the question that you've hopefully set in the first paragraph. I won't be covering basics like word choice. Making word choices should be in every scene of your story, not just the first. I'll be going over that later in the blog titled "Brevity & the Art of Word Choice."
There are four things that I consider to be good hooks, and some of them are interrelated, so I'll cover them in pairs.
First - Characters & Dialogue
While it is true that you can have characters monologue, and some of the best bits of literature have come from characters tormented by their own inner struggles, it is the rare case where a story does that in the opening scene.
More often, you will have a character talking to someone else. Not boring everyday stuff like "Pass the salt," "Okay," unless you add flavor to that dialogue by setting the perspective close to the character saying them and let the character's emotions bleed into the word choices you make in describing their actions around their dialogue.
As SirTruffles says in his blog Why Dialog Doesn't Matter ... Well, what it says on the tin actually.
But not exactly. Dialogue does matter, to make sense within the scene. You don't want your characters nattering on about dresses while they're drowning. That just doesn't make sense. Unless it's a comedy. Then it's hilarious. The point of the blog was that the words themselves aren't what's important, it's the actions that make those words mean something. Subtext. I'll explore that more in the Character blog.
To be honest, there's not a lot that I can say about character and dialogue here that won't devolve into a full deconstruction of character traits, depth and exploring the nuances and meanings of subtext.
Second - World & Atmosphere
This will touch a little on active setting and character filters. Bear with me.
The world that you create on paper or screen is the world that your characters interact with. It's the canvas upon which you paint your story. Without a world to write about, your reader will have no context in which to place the characters. World is a lot of things. It's society, geography, weather, history... There's more to it, but it is essentially everything that you have built for the world. For the world of MLP, a lot of this is done for us. But, we still need to stamp our mark into the world. This can be done with OCs, headcanons, other fanon, etc. This is our unique mark upon the world that we're writing in, whether it's as simple as Pinkie trying to deliver mail instead of planning parties or as vital and world changing as Celestia stepping down.
But this is just a structure. It's a building without any character to it. We assign meaning to them because we know these characters and we know their history, but to someone new to the fandom or new to your headcanon or alternate universe, it doesn't mean a lot.
How do we give it meaning, then? We add atmosphere.
It's the literal air that your characters breathe, but it's also the way that your characters view the world around them. What is a beautiful antique hoof stool to Applejack may be an annoying nuisance to Granny Smith, who's stumbled over it more times than she can count. These things add meaning to the objects in the world. They add character to the inanimate and give context to the animate.
To Fluttershy, the morning is glorious and beautiful, and she sings her love of the new day to all of her animals. To Rainbow Dash, the morning is just a continuation of nap time and the sun is trying to break up her dreams of joining the Wonderbolts.
We'll take a look at adjusting the story hook we started up above, the clunky one, and spruce up these four elements into a proper hook scene. If you're not into romance, it probably won't hook you, but for those of you who do enjoy the occasional romance, then this will hopefully titillate.
AppleShy Round 3!
Fluttershy kept flittering back to the window to keep track of Twilight's progress up the path. She couldn't stop herself. She'd be cleaning the floor, sweeping away the fur and dust that built up overnight, and then she'd find herself back at the window, unable to recall how she'd gotten there.
She knew what Twilight was coming for, she'd seen the signs. Applejack and Pinkie Pie gathering party supplies. Applejack sprucing up the farm with Big Mac and Apple Bloom. Applejack talking to Rarity about some new duds... She could make a list, she supposed.
Her hooves twitched. She found herself at her desk, staring down at her diary, pen held between her lips. She had no memory of opening her desk, fishing out the diary, or fetching her pen and inkwell. But there they were.
Shaking, she put down the pen and backed away from her desk.
She closed her diary and had to try a couple of times to put it back in the desk. But she kept reopening it and staring at the almost blank page where a single name was written. Applejack.
Knock-knock.
"Who's there?" Too soon!
"It's Twilight, Fluttershy. Can I come in to talk?" She sounded cheery, but what if she was here to try and talk her out of it? What if-
"Just a moment!" Where is Angel Bunny?! Her heart drummed a staccato beat in her ears. He would know what to do! She dashed from the kitchen, whipping her head back and forth in a wild search for him. Seconds ticked by. The pressure she felt from the front door increased, palpable as a gale of wind.
Knock-knock.
"Is everything okay in there?" The gale increased to a hurricane force. Where was he?!
"Just fine!"
He was probably off with his new bunny lady, some pert and perky-
Thoughts of Angel Bunny, looking so pleased with himself, so happy with his bunny lady pecked away at her selfish wants. She couldn't hold his happiness in abeyance forever. She had to let him go.
But she needed him. He'd gotten her through-
Her mind ground to a halt, and she snapped a wing, throwing aside the jealousy. "No, Fluttershy... He has his life now. You need to learn to take care of yourself."
She settled to the ground, but kept her wings open and extended. Breathe in. She brought the love she felt, the stirrings of air from her birds and the sounds of her smaller friends, and drew in those peaceful feelings.
Breathe out. All of the fears, the worries, the possible futures where she failed. Everything that made her want to give up and cry. Out they went. She folded her wings, feeling compact and light, no extra burdens on her back.
"Coming!" She went to open the door.
It was going to be a gorgeous day.
The kind of day she could say, "I love you."
Okay. Let's take a look at this and see if we can pick out the questions this hook raises. This isn't all of them, and my readers will probably find more.
Is Fluttershy watching for visitors? Is this something she does often?
Why doesn't she want to write down a list?
Has Angel Bunny's absence affected her so much? Did his presence act as a calmative?
Why does she pretend she doesn't know who's at the door?
... And on.
The story has already prompted the reader to ask several questions, or it should have. In order to answer those questions, some readers may guess, or they may not, but if they want to know then they will have to read on to see what the author has decided will happen.
The hook does not stand on its own however. It can't. Many of the best hooks don't show up until a couple pages into the story (for a book) or in the second chapter for a long fic. But, for shorter fics you want the hook to be either in the first chapter (at the least) or the first scene. In order to properly set up a hook, you need to set up the stakes on which the hook will be based. This means showing your character's life as it is just before the hook sinks in. You want the bit before the hook to engage your reader no less than the hook itself. It's the worm, the bait, with which you lure in a reader and get them to bite.
Let's take a look at what Fluttershy was doing before we try to get the reader to bite.
She'd had the dream again. Her covers lay in lumps and twists on the floor and her bed's fitted sheet lay snugly tucked over her rump. It was getting worse, the obsession, the need. The dreams were coming more frequently and more fervently the longer she pushed down what she wanted. But she wanted to live in those dreams... She closed her eyes and began to stroke her pillow again. It's still warm where her cheek had been resting. For a moment, the pillow wasn't a pillow at all, but a soft, sweetly scented, blond mane.
The sound of a caw from downstairs brought her back. Her birds would be hungry after a long night. And who knew what kind of noises she'd made in the night. Angel would usually wake her if she got too loud, then scold her for waking him up. Apparently she hadn't been all that noisy.
Starting her day after one of those dreams had always been hard. But that morning was especially hard. She would catch herself staring out the window, watching some daydream play out just past the pane of glass, only breaking out of it when one of her animals touched her hoof. It was during such a moment that she saw Twilight in the distance talking to Pinkie. And... And...
She stepped back from the window, trembling, and closed her eyes.
"It's just a daydream." That made sense. It was just a fancy, something she'd imagined.
She looked out the window again. The daydream was strangely persistent. Pinkie and Applejack went back to town, but Twilight was coming up the long trail to her house.
Do they know?!
Okay. So we've set up a little bit of the stakes. She's dreaming, and the dreams are getting worse? Is she really obsessing over something, or is she just being Fluttershy and thinking she is, but isn't? A new reader to the story might not know this, however, and I may have failed to set up the hook here, and perhaps was a little overbearing on the teasing of AppleShy shipping, but sometimes on the nose is better if you want to really get your readers invested. It's a bit blunt and on the nose, but sometimes that's necessary. Usually not for slice of life, though.
We've also set up a question, a little foreshadowing (blunt as all hell,) and set up some stakes. She's afraid of her friends finding out about her secret adoration. Maybe she's even afraid that it's only a crush and that they'll see through it and call her on her shallow love. Her friends would never do that, though. Her love would run deeply, swiftly, and as strongly as an ocean current. But also like that current, it would only surface occasionally to drive her surface actions inexorably towards her goal.
Anyway... That's probably best for another blog when I actually write The Wisdom of Dogs at the least, or go in depth in my idea journal on the depths of both Applejack and Fluttershy's feelings, history, and characters.
Back to Hooks. So the part above is the setup for the hook. It's the bait on the end, it's what entices your reader to get to the hook. You don't want your opening to be too blunt, or the hook won't have the right bite to it, it won't capture your reader the way it should. But, also a hook can be subtle. It can be a turning point for the character the story is following.
In this one, perhaps it could be shown that Fluttershy is being too nervous up front. But, by the time the hook sets, we see that she's moving past. Ideally, there would be more setup than this, but I've gone on long enough already and the point of this blog isn't to show an entire story from start to hook, only to demonstrate a few possible ways (and failures) that a hook should, and should not go about trying to hook a reader.
Let's see what the setup and the hook together do.
First: Story Question.
Will Fluttershy be able to admit to her friend that she's in love? That's the hook I'm going for. We set up a goal for our hero (Fluttershy) to accomplish. Come clean with her love for Applejack. But she's afraid. The hook begins to say that she can. But we've already seen what kind of worries she has. Even with the technique of pushing aside her fears and worries, when the time comes, can she actually do it?
Second: Tension.
The source of tension here is also the same as the source of the story question. Fluttershy's nervousness, her shyness, and her fear of being put on the spot all act as barriers to succeeding at what the reader wants her to succeed at - admitting her love to Applejack. These are the antagonizing forces in the story. Her own inner demons stand in her way. I'll cover those in my second blog on the fundamentals of storytelling: Character.
Third: Showing.
I'll admit, it was hard to get this to 'show' in the third person. I haven't done a full characterization and workup of Fluttershy yet. I've done a partial, including some backstory, but it's still fluid enough that I'm having a hard time keeping her actual, real motivations solid in my mind. I'll be working on that in the future. Knowing is key to showing character traits. Again, future blog topic...
The showing in this scene is her wanting to live in the dream she has, which implies that she'd prefer the dream to having to face what might be a far harsher reality. Those of you who've read my positively awful one-shot collection "What ifs and Never Weres" can see a prototype of that in the first one-shot in that story collection, Fluttershy's Love. Seriously, is bad... Dun' look.
But back to topic. Showing that a character is struggling with inner demons even at the start, those fears and obstacles that she places within herself, then you can paint a compelling picture of the character as a complex creature right from the start. You don't want to do what my first example did *shudder* and just tell it all right off. If your reader has to think about why she's acting that way, makes the gears in their brain move, then they become that much more invested in it. You also don't want to do what the second example did and be bland as all heck.
Honestly, looking back on it now, as I get ready to post this blog, I realize that hooks are tied so intrinsically to character that it's hard to get away from a discussion of character at the same time. There's a reason a lot of big name authors lead with the cry "Character is story!" when asked about their views on storytelling. Character is the biggest part of the story, in my book, but it's also not the only part of story.
I'll begin to cover those starting sometime next week, starting with the very, very start of the story: Concept.
Until then, and as always, put your thoughts, questions and your own hooks, please. Feel free to play around down there. If ya want some advice on a hook, or a story idea, feel free to post it as well, or PM me. I'm quite open and friendly. Also crazy. But that's me.
Thanks again for following and for reading,
Noble Thought
This is a really insightful blog about story hooks and them. You are an inspiration to writers everywhere (including myself)!
2101408
Thank you! I can't exactly take credit for the concepts. But I'll take credit for my execution and implementation of them. The concepts come from numerous books I've read, including the latest on my favorite list: Story Engineering. This is an attempt by me to distill what I learned, to test it out, and hopefully pass some of what I learned on to others in the form of examples, my own explanations, and ideas.
If you want to learn a lot more, look into getting that book. Link here: Story Engineering
It has a short section on story hooks as well, but it's more focused on the temporal placement and dramatic punch of the hook within the story as opposed to the content and execution of the hook, which I attempted to address here as well. Also, Story Engineering is much more focused on the dramatic action, thriller, and suspense novels (key word there, meaning commercial works) and gives little thought to romance or slice of life type stories. But the concepts he covers in the book are easily adaptable to other stories as well. It's just a matter of knowing what type of story you want to tell before you start.
This is a great lesson. A subtle hook is an effective hook.
I know this is vanity talking, but I love what I did with Shattered Dreams. I showed one problem, Rainbow being angry at her friends, while feeding in vague hints at something bigger. Then when Rainbow is talking to Fluttershy, BAM! About a fifth of the way through, I drop the line that sets the whole story up.
I had one comment saying he thought I was writting a FlutterDash story, and another saying that they liked my story despite how much they don't like plots like the one I had. I was proud of those comments. I thought they meant I surprised the readers.
On a side note, AppleShy seems to be popular on your blogs. How many of these examples you're giving us will make it into The Wisdom of Dogs?
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Practically zero will make it into The Wisdom of Dogs. These little tidbits are dreamt up during the writing of the blog. Me trying to get into Flutter's horseshoes. They're practice, I guess. Following up with the next series covering the fundamentals, I'm going to be going into Mare in the Moon territory and probably some of The Lost Past.
There's not a lot to talk about with regards to Concept with The Wisdom of Dogs. It's a simple tale, and I intend it to be that way. Saying goodbye shouldn't be complicated.
I may touch on it again in Character because Fluttershy's episodes tend to be amazing when it comes to unraveling a complex psyche.
Mare in the Moon has a lot more that it tries to set up in terms of world building, concept, character arc, and story structure.
I'm going to need to read this one Saturday morning. Or on a Monday morning. I just need to have something immediately to hand to distract myself. I want to be able to... I'm just scared. I hope you don't think...
Ugh. Sorry.
Subtle? I thought I was blunter than a sledge... Maybe I need to rethink what I think subtle means.
2106960
I meant that idea about baiting the hook. I remember that the first line in the first Romance story I tried to write was, "This night was perfect." Then I went on to tell the things the two ponies did to make the night perfect. They weren't important enough to show the details, they just made the night perfect. Just...
And I still don't blame you one bit for not reading my story. I even tried to keep my comment vague for you. If it's not your thing, it's not your thing.
2107026
Gotcha. On both counts. I may still read it at some point when I need some pain to put Into a story. Like towards the end of The Wisdom of Dogs. There's no pain more clear than what you feel yourself.
Subtlety isn't my strong suit honestly. I'm working on it.
Thanks for participating so much Mind's Eye. It means a lot.