Where do you begin a story? At the beginning, of course.

Well, maybe not. Hard news writers, the actual reporters among us, have to begin their leads with the time-honored 5Ws and H: Who? What? When? Where? Why? How? Composition instructors insist you start off with your topic sentence paragraph: here’s what I’m going to tell you in the rest of this essay. Those formulae tend to beget formulaic writing which is fine, because the genres involved are information-based.

But what about the rest of us? We’re the ones doing the soft news pieces, the feature articles, the blog posts, the creative non-fiction–and we have no formula to follow. Which is a good thing and a bad thing. Worst things first: it’s a bad thing because it’s scary to be facing the blank page with nothing to guide you. It’s a good thing because it gives us the freedom to begin at exactly the right point in the story.

And that is…..? I don’t know, because it’s your story. Sometimes the best place to start is in the middle. Sometimes it’s better to start at the end. Just know that where you start is where your reader begins to engage with you. And if you’re not engaging at that point, it’s where your reader turns the page or hits Escape.

So, what is the one thing about your piece that you think will catch your readers and draw them in? Go look at several pieces of writing that really hooked you. Where in the story did the writer start? Now go back and look at some of your recent pieces–where did you start? Analyze them:  was there somewhere else you could have opened the piece? Fool around with changing up the order of your ideas. Switch up the ending with the beginning. What happens? Play around. Have fun. Forget any rules you know and go with your gut.

I went with my gut in a piece I just finished editing that will be posted on MidLifeBloggers on Friday. It was a well-written essay, but it didn’t start in the best possible place. So I pulled the middle of the essay out and put it at the beginning. Just a simple tweak, but I think it makes a world of difference.

Have you been to BlogHer’10 Room Of Your Own Proposals and voted for Upping the Ante: Moving From “Just Blogging” to Writing Creative Non-Fiction? Are you going to BlogHer’10 and want to help present this? Check that box too when you vote.  There are only twenty days left to vote!