Don't forget to begin with the main character complaining about their day to day life. Readers love reading about petty complaints.

Not to make the wattpad joke again, but this is totally something people on Wattpad needs

I'm proud of myself. My first sentence: "It's easier to pull the trigger if you look away."

Best story opening EVER: "Hi, I'm Edward, and I'm the linebacker in our college team - I'm a 6'11 blonde beefcake with a huge 10 inch d***, and here I am at my 18th birthday. Oh, did I mention I'm also the reincarnation of Merlin?" I wish I could count how many times I've read a story that started like that. Honestly, they're probably not *all* terrible....but with an opening like that, I'm not going to find out.

I want a story where they wake up and do their daily routine but one thing is out of place. "I woke up, took off my elaborately described Pajamas, and replaced them with my less elaborate outfit. Brushed my teeth. Murdered the traitorous rebel, and then stood in line for my breakfast rations."

Authors should start the story with something unexpected. SPANISH INQUISITION!!!!

There is nothing wrong with a setting up a fake main character, so long as you make their death interesting and important.

Best opening line in a book: "The sky was the color of cat puke" From 'Uglies' by Scott Westerfeld. He also then proceeds to describe what the cat would have had to eat to get that specific color.

Hours... And hours... And hours of character description. That's what they story is really about, right?

Doesn't weather automatically establish the atmosphere? After all, the mere presence of weather provides all sorts of information about its composition and density.

"A quiet day of surfing the internet at the local library was interrupted when Nazis kicked in the front door." That's it. I'm out

"Reades rarely get distracted while reading a boo-Bored now." Why am I laughing so hard at this throwaway joke?

You can tell just how inaccurate the Pie Chart is by how small the *"Showing off how awesome Mary Sue is"* slice is and the conspicuous absence of a *"Love Triangle"* slice.

Another great advice, I'm using them in my book, I titled it "Twilight".

Monster Hunter International by Larry Correia still has my favorite opening line: "On an otherwise normal Tuesday evening I had the chance to live the American dream. I was able to throw my incompetent jackass of a boss from a fourteenth-story window." Now tell me that doesn't make you want to keep reading.....

“It was an average day in the fishing town of Aron, a breeze was blowing, the fish were swimming, and about half of the town was on fire again”

I know when I read a story, the *first* thing I look for is the flow chart!

100 years ago, a prophecy was made. "A girl named Mary Sue will beat a bad guy." Mary Sue woke up and flipped her lusciously luxuriant long brown hair out of her deep ocean blue eyes before looking out her window at the clear sky. She got out of her dark oak bed and chose a beautiful pink long-sleeved dress with sequins running from the silken belt down to the floor-length hem. "A princess must always look her best!"

My potential beginning: “Another day, _another hole in my wall.”_

Don’t forget to use a mirror to describe how the main character looks! - Stephenie Meyer in a nutshell

''My book has a beginning'' ok this made me totaly interested, i will buy this shit

You forgot the epitome of book introductions, the character dump bio sheet! Name: Age: Eye colour: Appearance: Personality: Powers: Equipment: Are you excited yet!?

I once tried reading the original Peter Pan book. By the time I gave up, I had no idea whether the book was talking about the river system of the Neverlands, human anatomy, or a map. I'm not joking. Then I skipped to the end, but I got even more confused when Peter Pan decided to kiss the mother of the three children he had just brought back from Neverland and everyone was ok with that, even though he was the one who broke in during the middle of the night and stole them from that very room a few decades ago. I can only hope that I'm just an idiot who can't read, because people make children's shows out of this book.

Don't forget that while gazing at their physical reflection they should also be contemplating all of their emotional and internal traits while recalling their entire backstory and paper-thin motivations

The next episode should be Superheroes. Half of the stills would just be black.

That's stupid. There is only one way to do it well and that is to make the entire book exposition. Now you eliminated every pitfall you'll ever encounter EVER.

Me starting a book: "Hey, I'll just write an edgy opening dialogue line and go from there!" Pg 1: "Look at them.They think you're going to save them."

How about Terrible Writing Advice: Coming of Age Stories?

No Love triangle in this video, I'm disappointed !!

If I had a nickel for every time the protagonist of the story gazes into a reflective surface and feels compelled to describe themselves to nobody in particular, I'd be rich.

I’m trying to write a book, and when I saw this video I thought, “okay, great. I should watch this video and as long as I haven’t done anything this character recommends, I should be fine.” *story begins with a dream sequence then looking in a mirror* “Well shi-“

I remember when I was 13 I thought being an author would be cool, so I tried to write a book. Years later, I have since purged that from my mind. I find it funny that everything you say not to do with fantasy novels is basically what I did as a kid. Good thing I'm now an adult who can see further beyond simple conflicts and can build worlds and themes through symbolism. Keep up the good work! You're incredibly entertaining to watch, and your messages are quite good.

But what if the flow chart doesn't even work? *looks at the Zelda series*

You got it all wrong J.P! The beginning is all about setting up the love triangle!

Remember that the best way to use the "in medias res" style of opening a story is to give a paragraph or two from the middle of the climax, then suddenly cut of off with some version of "Wait, let me start at the beginning" and then begin the info dump. That will in no way mess with the pacing early on, nor is it at all overused.

FOR THE READERS: Here was a rule that I think all of us might agree on. The 3 Chapter rule. Explanation: Where if the first chapter seems kinda bad, you have to move on to another (2) chapters. Some authors are bad at portraying starting chapters, but get better soon after. Take The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo for example, the beginning was slow-paced and boring but around the second or third chapter things got better. They say don't judge a book by its cover, don't judge it by it's first chapter too. (**But if you can clearly see the bad grammar and terrible spelling you might wanna back off.) ^^ Good creators are mostly self conscious of their work and they will double-check​ to make sure they make a good first impression. Just wanted to drop by this optional rule, love your videos btw!

I'm currently trying to begin a story. That is to say, I finished writing the entire story, scrapped it, and now I'm starting over. Which somehow is even harder now that I got the plot and the stacks upon stacks of lore all figured out, as I try to avoid these pitfalls. Pretty sure I'm at that point where the story is going to burn in purgatory forever as my life flies by.

OHHH! The next Bad Writing Advice should just be about Dream Sequences! They tend to be excessively literal prophetic dreams and often don't shed any real light on our protagonist at all.

Anything with a Latin name is a good idea? Better prepare the Deus Ex Machina.

100 Years of Solitude begins with "Muchos años después, frente al pelotón de fusilamiento, el coronel Aureliano Buendía habría de recordar aquella tarde remota en que su padre lo llevó a conocer el hielo." "Many years later, in front of the firing squad, the colonel was to remember that distant afternoon..." Now THAT single sentence requires a flowchart. Many years later -> Puts you in the future of the time in which the sentence begin. There's already two diferent moments in those three words. He was to remember -> Sends us back even before whatever was in the many years later. That's an 'in medias res' that sends us into the future and then sends us into a flashback. There are whole literary essays about that single phrase of the beginning. Its beautiful.

Is this a good opening intro? "As his mass entered I moaned in suprise then he opened the curtains and I realized it was Monday" sex sells therfore my story is great

I think having the prologue take place centuries before the story works fine, provided the events discussed are relevant to the main story or at least get the audience curious as to what the connection is.

Always go with the American Psycho route: Classical piano music in the background while the character monologues for a whole bunch about how amazing they are.

"This story starts in the basement of a Denny's, as these kinds of stories often do." is the opening line to my Undertale fanfiction.

Say, what do you get when you mix an alcoholic beverage with a killed off fanfiction OC protagonist? A Bloody Mary.

> introduce main character in hometown who has symbolic dream before engaging in morning routine perfect, i have all of these :DDDDD

"the building was on fire and it wasn't my fault." -harry dresden.

My favorite opening line was from Babylon: “Oh no. I killed the chicken.”

Fir- *Shot immediately*

how about terrible writing advice: edgy caracters? I see this cliche so much.

3:30 This perfectly explains the dilemma of modern literature. My problem with most novels these days is that they are clearly trying to make a low-effort book that would be better as a movie that gets juuuuuuuuust enough of a following that a studio picks it up and makes it into a movie and you get famous. But then the book ends up being a movie without visuals or sounds which is totally boring. You just can't read the book without constantly thinking about "this stuff would be cool to see/hear, but it's a hassle to listen to the author describe it all day. Why couldn't this have just been a movie? Oh wait, it is." Although one thing the writer will do is add way too much exposition to fit into a movie, so that when the movie comes out some fan of the book will be all like "That movie sucked. The book was *so* much better. The movie skipped over too many vital scenes such as [insert random detail about a character's past that does not improve the story] and skipping that stuff just ruins the story!" and then that will draw fans of the movie to buy the book so that it still makes money.

Start with the pretentious line "THe universe is more horrifiying and wonderful than we could ever imagine." The rest is then braindead action - and I'm actually proud of it.

Wait a minute. Where the fuck is the resources dedicated to the Love Triangle? Doesn't every true author allocate some resources to the love triangle. Or Tetrahedron. Or whatever geometric shape of choice?

If you want a good example for how to start a story just look at the bee movie script "according to all known laws of aviation..."

It's important to remember that people read books for the same reason they read user manuals: an elaborate and exhaustive detailing of information with nothing interesting happening.

Oh no. I have a story starting with a mysterious dream sequence followed by a morning routine. And it's not even a well written morning routine 😔 Yep, revisions will be happening

To quote Yahtzee, "Are you telling the most interesting part of the character's life? If not, why not?"

You say killing off the intro character is a bad idea, but it seemed to work pretty good for A Game of Thrones.

I have some ideas 1. SCP terrible writing advice 2. Creepypasta terrible writing advice 3. News terrible writing advice (joke that fake news is good to write) 4. Terrible writing advice making fanfiction 5. Terrible writing advice superhero settings

I imagine that a more "cinematic" approach would be useful in graphic novels such as the use of establishing shots and maybe a few panels that form a sort of panning shot.

"Sorry if my voice sounds a bit different, I recently upgraded my Beer." Almost as good as misheard song lyrics.

This video describes my current work . . . . Well crap. I'll just ignore the sarcasm. Ignorance is bliss.

Actually sometimes the whole introducing a character and then the real main character because sometimes it can give the audience important information that the main character might not know adding in some dramatic irony

About the attention span of the reader... it's actually more common than not to find the quickest and more catchy start in modern "literature" because of that. If we take Narnia, or Tolkien, or even His Dark Materials and Harry Potter... it's always a slow burn. Expecially in Lord of the Ring. I actually like this kind of slower starts :)

1:53 - 2:08 Basically RPG character creation in a nutshell

Even though I'm working on a comic, the advice in all these videos has been invaluable. I'm working with a visual medium, so what? EXPOSITION. Describing the beauty of the main character in words works way better than just showing them. Art is hard. I like shortcuts.

The Way of Kings (one of the better books I've read lately) starts with a prologue that happens thousands of years before the story, then moves to a first chapter that happens 6 months before the real story and where the POV is an extra that died in that same chapter. Not that your points are invalidated by one single example, just thought that it's pretty funny that all those Terrible Writing Advice fits in such a good book.

Why is no one talking abut the featured fanart?

Or in Uncharted 4's case, start with in medias res, followed by a flashback, followed by a flashback but with more flash and less back, then move into the beginning of the story, but then into a flashback to something that didn't actually happen, then move back into the the present!

Hey, do you take suggestions? Because if so, I have an episode suggestion. Magic Systems! I can already see what it might be like... "If you're creating a magic system, don't worry about being original. Just steal it from someone else, that definitely won't seem boring and uninteresting to the reader."

What makes it worse is when the entire first chapter is just one giant infodump showcasing how special your OC is and how insignificant/better SHE is compared to everyone else, especially in a Crossover and those are infamous for this garbage. Nothing makes u want to burn a book faster than that BS.

I love how much work he puts into the little details which go by so fast. It's awesome

This episode briefly touches on symbolism, which makes me hope you'll do a whole episode on that. It's something that's used poorly by so many writers. No, your story's not deep just because you have symbolism implying that your main character is basically Jesus.

My drug shipment is finnaly there !

“If you’re writing a fantasy novel, I’m pretty sure that there’s some sort of law or something saying you have to start with a prologue”. That one killed me. Figuratively speaking.

Prologue: Focusing on characters from a far bygone era. Chapter 1: Flashback Chapter 2: Flashback within a Flashback Chapter 3: In Medias Reis Chapter 4: POV on completely irrelevant character Chapter 5: Filmmaking POV homing in on main character, before going way overboard on what s/he looks like. Chapter 6: Info dumping on the history of the world. Chapter 7: Info dumping on the history of the home town. Chapter 8: Dark Lord finds Chosen One and destroys his/her hometown, thus beginning hero's journey. Chapter 9: Chosen One learns about the Prophecy, and that s/he is destined to "chose between Jeff or Steve," and to stop to Dark Lord "with the Power of True Love, and maybe with a side of the Power of Friendship." Chapter 10: In Medias Reis is resolved following another action set piece. Chosen One gets captured by the Dark Lord. Chapter 11: Chosen One rambles on and on and on about Environmentalism, and everybody, including the Dark Lord, immediately falls in love with the Chosen One while the evil imperial troops either fall asleep or flee from the pretentious preaching. Chapter 12: The Dark Lord marries the Chosen One, and when he embraces Mary Sue--dah, I mean the Chosen One's--to kiss, he immediately explodes, thus destroying the Dark Lord with the Power of True Love. Chapter 13: With Steve dead, Mary Sue is forced to settle down with Jeff. Unfortunately, Mary Sue suddenly has an epic relapse and suffers a fatalist identity crisis. Which doesn't effect her yet. Chapter 14: Cut to 2000 years later in present day, and Mary Sue is suddenly jaded and with an identity crisis. She has grown into a vegetable where she automatically succeeds in everything. She is unemployed and flat broke, and yet whenever she needs money, she somehow has it. The universe at this point literally revolves around benefiting her at all cost. Chapter 15: No idea how to end the book here. I guess it involves Mary Sue entering a fetal position wondering when or if she will ever die. After all, she sunbathes in the Arctic, goes deep diving into magma, gets eaten by dragons, giants, and other monstrosities, traps herself in an underwater cage with a plastic bag over her head, and skydives while strapped to an anchor. And yet she cannot die, or suffer, or anything. Even if she sits around and does nothing, she still wins at everything, and the whole world loves her unconditionally to the point that nothing has any meaning or purpose to her anymore. It's kind of like a reverse Charlie Brown at this point.

do animal sidekicks next

I'm really happy that this channel grew in popularity during the last months, it really deserves it.

I think this is the only time, ever, that I've laughed so hard I had to pause everything and recover before continuing. Woooh.. ok, last two minutes.. Seriously wiping tears right now.

This is really helping me gain the confidence to start something I'm making. I was worried I wasn't doing it right, but I am starting with main character motivations and characterizations, and not with prologues and flashbacks like I would as child. So, I guess it's sometimes super helpful to hear what 'not' to do all in a lump like this. Thanks.

"Just give them a flow chart or something they'l be fine." Words to live by.

99% wattpad stories™

...and the only part I've written of my novel is a prologue with a brief history. it'd be great if I were joking... but I'm not.

2:09 Nothing against JoJo, but this totally reminded me of Jonathan in Phantom Blood (he did go through an arc first, but it feels like he wasn’t even a main character since his arc was pretty much made to set up Dio and a few other characters like Speedwagon before he died unexpectedly after we got to empathize with him)

A flashback, within a flashback, inside a dream as part of the prologue that then precedes to a flashback of the In Medias Res that contains a dream flashing back to the prequel that also contains a dream that predicts the ending that won't happen unless there are few more flashbacks to the fourth sequel

This show is actually good advice. I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing with my writing. My characters are inconsistent, my plot never stays in one direction, and my world building skills are non-existent. This show actually shows what not to do with those concepts, and really helps.

When writing a fantasy novel, be sure to always provide a map so your confusing and unengaging story can be easily charted

This is where I really learn how to write a story.

As much as I like this, I feel as though you're going to end up getting "famous" because of your "Terrible Writing Advice" series and not because of your novels (which I should get around to buying, it sounds pretty cool). But hey, at least you could be helping guide and inspire one of the next literary legends of tomorrow!

I just started my story so I needed this.

I love the 'bored now' part. Whenever I'm getting bored of something, I always just say bored now in that tone

I think the best introduction information dump is Brave New World. I sometimes re-read just that part because it gives plenty to reflect on on its own.

I'm surprised you didn't bring up the Love Triangle.

Ik your name is Terrible Writing Advice, but I can't help but take you 100% seriously

I think a way to combine two ideas in this in an actually good way is to start with an intro character, cut to the real main character waking up after seeing the intro character (supposedly) die, and later on reveal that the intro character is actually the villain who miraculously survived but was forever a changed man from the experience.

0:30 that chart is actually pretty dang accurate and handy, I might use that sometime

you should do terrible book review

Typing a comment before watching the opening of the video.

I have also seen an opening dream sequence done well. The brief one at the beginning of _Deep Rise_ by Nighzmarquls establishes that the main character has never seen a sky before and is disgusted by encountering creatures with a skeleton inside them. This intrigues the reader about what sort of waking world they must inhabit. The brief nightmare at the beginning of _Understand_ by Ted Chiang sets up the explanation for how the character ended up in this situation and shows that their memory is improving.

An opening line involving the weather... "So how's the weather today?" "Eh, same as always. Terrible, muggy, fire raining down, you know the usual."