Hello! This is my first time asking but I could I have some advice on how to write a story that starts in the climax of the plot already? The context is my MC woke up and they are not able to remember anything, but suddenly, he just woke up in the wards of his family (a very strong political figure in their world might I add) whom he told what his life was but the narratives they are telling does not match even in the slightest of the flashback that's plaguing him as the time stretches. And they were in the middle of the war, too. I'm having a hard time to achieve that mind-blowing... thrill I suppose? They also got a love interest that is unmistakably not the one his family claimed ‘their-spouse’ to be.
Remember: your story's climax is the moment your character faces off against the antagonist once and for all. While some stories do start at the climax, and then flashback to the beginning of the story to build back up to it, it doesn't mean you start at the climax and move forward from there.
I think there can be a lot of confusion with the concept of "In Media Res" which a lot of people confuse as meaning starting in the literal middle of the story, or at the inciting incident or climax. Instead, "in media res" simply means starting in the middle of the action. That action can be the inciting incident, the climax, or the literal middle, but again, it doesn't mean the story moves forward from there.
If you're starting your story at the point where your character wakes up without their memories, this isn't the climax but rather the inciting incident. This is the moment when their life and world are turned upside down. Starting at this moment in a story about memory loss is a great way to go, because your reader knows as little about the character and their world as the character does. It puts the reader in your character's shoes right from the start, and they'll be learning everything right alongside your character.
So, that's really the key is to make sure you're filling in the gaps left by not having an exposition. You'll need to make sure to fairly quickly illustrate this character's natural personality, the world they've woken up into, and what their life was apparently like before they lost their memories. If they're being lied to, you may want to build in some clues that hint at what their actual life was like--such as feeling a place is familiar to them even if they're told "no, you would never have been to such a place."
As far as creating that thrill in that opening moment, it's really going to come down to emotional and sensory description. In lieu of recognizing who they are, where they are, and what happened to them, they're going to focus on their immediate surroundings. What can they see, hear, smell, taste, feel? What does that sensory input tell them about who they are and where they are? How does that sensory input--and what they can learn from it--make them feel? What emotions are they feeling as they process this unfamiliar environment and realize they have no idea who they are, where they are, or what happened to them?
I hope that helps!
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I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!
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