Now that I’m at the end…
Now that I’m at the end I know the beginning.
I’ve heard other writers make similar statements but I never really understood what they meant. How could you not know where you story starts? Isn’t that one of the most crucial parts? Shouldn’t you know that right from the get-go? It turns out, it’s not that simple.
I’m in the final editing phase of my Christian contemporary grown-up novel and I’m trawling through my manuscript one last time, backwards, for maximum impact. I’m reading through each section (beginning, beginning-of-the-middle, middle-of-the-middle, end-of-the-middle and end) in reverse order and checking that each scene is fulfilling its function, as per the Super Secret Never to be Shared Guidelines given by my writing tutor, Kim Wilkins, from Year of the Edit. This is a great exercise as it challenges me to think about what each scene is achieving and whether it has earned its place in my novel. When I started at the end I couldn’t shake the feeling that my beginning scene wasn’t the right one to open my book. You see, after my critique in the very first week of Year of the Edit I culled a lot of the first few chapters. I think overall that has been an excellent choice, but I still haven’t been certain of my opening scene. It’s emotionally strong and definitely centres people in the events that are taking place, but my real issue was that it wasn’t a scene from my main character’s point of view. This bugged me, but I wasn’t sure what to do about it.
I’m happy to say that now I’m at the end I know the beginning. It turns out that one of the scenes I culled early on will be making a freshly-written comeback and will grace the first pages of my novel. I need to orient the reader into the situation through the eyes of my main character, Tanner, before I can get the rest of the story underway. I have a certainty about my opening scene choice that I haven’t had up until now. It turns out all those experienced writers who said they often wrote the beginning last were onto something. 
Thanks for the post, Karen, and for sharing the “Never to be shared” guidelines:-)
Sounds like you are making great progress with your novel. Congratulations!
Dee:-)
Great idea to read the scenes backwards, I’ll have to try that out when I finish this round of edits on my novel.
The beginning is the hardest part to get right I think. I’ve rewritten my first chapter so many times I’ve lost count.
That’s the fun thing about writing. It doesn’t always go to plan. Glad you’ve found your solution.
Interesting post, Karen. You have obviously enjoyed the Year of the Edit as well as learned so much!
Congratulations on now knowing your beginning, Karen. Thanks for sharing your experiences. It’s always good to hear how other writers work with their stories. Best of luck!
Oh, I just can’t wait to read your novel… now I’m itching to start already!
Have fun with the end, um I mean the beginning.
wow – sounds like you’ve worked it out
Thanks everyone. It’s so lovely of all you to take the time to stop by and read my blog. And yes, it is lovely to know how my story begins. Now I’ve just got to write it…
Dee, Kim’s Top Secret Guidelines literally had ‘…eat this as soon as you’re done with it’ on the top. Lucky it wasn’t one of the ‘this message will self-destruct in 10 seconds’ varieties. And I would recommend everyone doing Year of the Edit just for this checklist alone…although the other 95% of the course was pretty awesome too!
Jo, reading backwards was awesome. It gave me a totally different perspective on the entire book. And having now written that difficult first scene I’m actually really happy with it. Let’s hope my beta-readers think so too!!