Fishing for Readers
A number of months ago I read an article which was critical of the advice we often give to Creative Writing students in which we encourage them to begin their stories in the thick of action, or in medias res. The argument goes that writers must capture the reader’s interest right at the beginning by ‘hooking them in’ so they feel compelled to continue reading. Often this ‘hook’ is achieved through the creation of intrigue, something or someone which is obviously out of place or which otherwise encourages the reader to ask questions. At other times it involves a piece of high drama and the reader is dropped straight into a piece of unfolding action. At the same time that we encourage students to work on their hooks, we tend to shoo them away from using too much description at the beginning of a story. Readers’ attention spans have shortened, we say, and if a writer doesn’t grab reader’s interest in the first couple of paragraphs – or in the case o...