Louise Doughty - Beginning A Novel Session

1.

My wife and I decide to separate, and then suddenly we are almost happy together. The pathos of our situation, our private and unique tragedy, lends romance to each small act. We see everything in the round, the facets as opposed to the flat banality that was wedging us apart. When she asks me to go to the Mendel Art Gallery Sunday afternoon, I do not say no with the usual mounting irritation that drives me into myself. I say yes and some hardness within me seems to melt into a pleasant sadness.

2.

Mrs Mooney was a butcher’s daughter. She was a woman who was quite able to keep things to herself: a determined woman. She had married her father’s foreman and opened a butchers‘ shop near Spring Gardens. But as soon as his father-in-law was dead Mr Mooney began to go to the devil.

3.

I remember how, that night, I lay awake in the wagon-lit in a tender, delicious ecstasy of excitement, my burning cheek pressed against the impeccable linen of the pillow and the pounding of my heart mimicking that of the great pistons ceaselessly thrusting the train for me through the night, away from Paris, away from girlhood, away from the white enclosed quietude of my mother’s apartment, into the unguessable country of marriage.

4.

As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a giant insect. He was lying on his hard, as it were armour-plated, back and when he lifted his head a little he could see his dome-like brown belly divided into stiff arched segments on top of which the bed-quilt could hardly keep him in position and was about to slide off completely. His numerous legs, which were pitifully thin compared to the rest of the bulk, waved helplessly before his eyes.

5.

Everybody knows that Tuxedo has good ideas about as often has a hen has teeth. Which is why Tuxedo is on his own this particular night, crouching with his ear to the tumbrils of a small safe behind the counter of the video shop. The snag is that Tuxedo is not built for crouching lower than a pool table. His left foot has cramp and his blue satin boxer shorts are twisted in his crotch causing him aggravation. On top of all this, twiddling the knobs on the safe is getting him nowhere and he is overcome by a craving for sweet potato pie.

6.

I saw my first corpse on Thursday. Today it was Sunday and there was nothing to do. And it was hot. I have never known it so hot in England. Towards midday I decided to go on a walk. I stood outside the house, hesitating. I was not sure whether to go left or right. Charlie was on the other side of the street underneath the car. He must’ve seen my legs for he called out.

Lessons:

• Announce your presence as a writer on the page with confidence
• Be a safe pair of hands 
• No throat clearing necessary
• Invite the reader into your world
• An 'arch' or knowing/omniscient tone of voice dates a modern novel
• The price of invention (originality) can be to limit your readership. Know what you're after! (Awards or sales!)
• High octane beginnings need to be sustained. Is that right for your kind of novel? Is the tone a fair promise?
• Insinuate a relationship in the first paragraph as a way to develop the story quickly
• The opening is a microcosm of the main character - who they are through and through
• Look up openings of novels you admire on Amazon (Look Inside function)