Starting A Story With Dialogue — I Did It

Yes, starting a story with dialogue is a writing don’t. I did it anyway. This post will explain why and how I did it.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Why It’s Typically Not a Good Idea

We are normally advised against starting a story with dialogue because it gives you no setting, no actions, and no character descriptions to envision the scene and give it meaning for the reader. This makes the important first scene of your story less impactful and possibly even difficult to understand.

Why I Started a Story With Dialogue

While writing a short story for my collection titled, The Breaking, I kept envisioning and couldn’t really shake the idea that both the most grabbing first line and the most informative first line for this particular story was a brief, punchy remark stating how one of the characters felt. It was the point for the story, working out this feeling, so if someone wants to get right away where I’m going with it, that line will mean a lot more to them than descriptions or action leading into it.

How I Went About It

The beginning of the story titled, Apple-wise:

“Praying doesn’t help me,” Emma told her husband, Adrian, as she patted the dirt around her tomato plant with excessive force, tendrils of dark hair falling out of her ponytail and into her face.

“It can help anybody.” Adrian dug the hole for the next plant, calmly continuing with his work, not realizing how little his offering had helped.

I stuck to my decision to start the story with dialogue and immediately led the reader into revealing character intros, action, and a hint at the setting with these long tags.

Now, I guess I could have described Emma and her aggressive planting, therefore her actions and attitude, before dropping the line. That would be a happy medium, I suppose. But doesn’t putting her words at the beginning instantly grab?

Should You Start a Story With Dialogue?

It is risky. But if you give it serious thought and it seems like a better way to tell your story than going with conventional advice, then I say you should go for it.