I have a story I'm trying to write, but despite having a bunch of background info, characters, and general plot points...

I have a story I'm trying to write, but despite having a bunch of background info, characters, and general plot points, I have no idea how it should start. If anyone is willing to help me out I'll post what I have. Thanks in advance

Other urls found in this thread:

birthmoviesdeath.com/2013/12/11/hulks-screenwriting-101-excerpt-the-myth-of-3-act-structure
twitter.com/AnonBabble

just start

start with a murder

I have barely anything that could be used as a beginning. Most of what I have is middle to end stuff

The story is about a demon-summoning protagonist who, with his familiar, start making enemies with some pretty dangerous entities and it leads up to a cosmic power vacuum of sorts that gets filled by the protagonist, resetting the universe

Gonzo. Start in the middle of the action

Hmm
Dubs never lie...
Should I just start with a ritual scene?

Sounds interesting, do it.

vonnegut said to start the story as late as possible. everyone here thinks he’s a hack though.

Woah dude, that sounds epic. what if there was like this martial arts master with a bo staff but here's the twist, the martial arts master isn't some old dude with a beard, but a little girl! Could you maybe introduce her as jumping from a height and landing on one knee? I dunno, that's up to you but I'm digging what we got so far.

How does this sound:
In a place such as Italy, the tourists always seem to fawn over and look forward to the nights. But no tourist could look forward to tonight more than [PROTAG]. Tonight was special.
Seeing that he had everything, [PROTAG] left his house and off into the unusually somber night and to the abandoned building that all of his coven would be meeting at.
Upon arriving, he soon realized that he had missed the Mass. Determined to take advantage of the night, however, [PROTAG] began his own rituals. A summoning, to be exact.
Tonight was good for rites of that sort.

I would, but that kinda ruins the potential for twists and reveals later on, imo

I like the idea. Think she should be an antagonist or protagonist?

Once he set up the proper sigils and symbols, he called to his familiar, "Bring me the poor sod."
The hellish being did so, dragging along a drunk. Now everything was set to summon some hellspawn and the night was still young. Offering the drunk as a sacrifice he called out to the denizens of Hell, asking for a contract.
"I give you this man's soul, and in return I request that you give me a powerful companion, only until my time has passed."
It would seem as though something heard his offer, as the demon Mephistopheles was soon before him.

You didn't listen to what he said. J U S T S T A R T. Doesn't matter. Just start writing about something in the narrative that you have a solid enough vision of and go. It will become easier and easier. At this stage you just need to generate content. Editing is where the actual work is. Right now you just need to get something rough that you can make refined.

just start in medias res, decide if you want a beginning later

Huh?

It's EXACTLY the opposite.

Starting the story late is what makes twists and reveals possible.

Think about Star Wars. Suppose we started with The Phantom Menace. We get all the story from the start. We know Luke's background. How much of a twist is the end of Empire Strikes Back? No twist at all.

Star Wars (the original trilogy) is the perfect example of how good it is to start late in a story. Think of all the gradual reveals when Luke first meets Kenobi - the way it hints at a whole enormous bulk of past events just with a few lines of dialogue and a few musical clues. That's where all the resonance comes from - the very gradual unfolding of backstory.

i advise you not to start

I usualy start my books in a daily routien, usualy when the characters are just waking up or a few minutes after they are ready for another day.
Thats what I usualy do.
But the story content also need to be taken into consideration.
You can start in the middle of the action or on the way for the action to happen, if you ask me.

Read this and ignore the gimick

birthmoviesdeath.com/2013/12/11/hulks-screenwriting-101-excerpt-the-myth-of-3-act-structure

the tl;dr is choose some characters and then present the meaningful choices those characters make, the context to understand how they are meaningful (just enough of their world and their personalities and personal histories,) and then their consequences, and you will have a story.

Wake up early every day and write 500 - 100 words while you drink coffee and you'll have written a novel in a few months. Then you can spend some time adding things you think are just cool as well as making everything better.

>Wake up early every day and write 500 - 100 words while you drink coffee and you'll have written a novel in a few months
At 500 word per day it would take around six months to write a story. One that will be poorly structured and feel like every other paragraph was written in a different state of mind, which it was, because you stopped for a whole day in between each one.

500 - 1000 words a day as a minimum. Probably a thousand for a fantasy novel like OP wants to write, because the manuscript will probably be around 100k.

Every morning, write exactly 200 words.

Every evening, revise the whole work and cut out the worst 10%.

Eventually the work will stabilize at exactly 1800 words and just get better rather than longer.

After a year you will have the best short story ever.

...

How about you kill yourself instead?

Get your math straight retard

If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.