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one, or the beginning of chapter two, the wife gets the
report that the husband has died in a car accident.
Not soon enough.
So what can you do if you absolutely insist on having
a “normal life” opening chapter, after you’ve considered
every other alternative?
You can at least put in a portent at the beginning,
enough to carry the reader along for a few pages.
Dean Koontz opens Tick Tock like this:
Out of a cloudless sky on a windless Novem-
ber day came a sudden shadow that swooped
across the bright aqua Corvette. Tommy Phan
was standing beside the car, in pleasantly warm
autumn sunshine, holding out his hand to ac-
cept the keys from Jim Shine, the salesman, when
the fl eeting shade touched him. He heard a brief
thrumming like frantic wings. Glancing up, he ex-
pected to glimpse a sea gull, but not a single bird
was in sight.
The scene continues as Tommy Phan gets the keys
to the Corvette (which inexplicably chill him) and hap-
pily drives away, talks to his mother on the phone, and
so on with his normal life. But the portentous opening
images and feelings give us a little breath of disturbance
to carry us along.
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