Hi, so I'm wondering what's a good way of transitioning into the introduction of the main character of my story. I begin it with a breif insight on the character's past but can't think of a clever way of introducing the details of this character. Any ideas would be appreciated.
If external details, like hair colour and friends, this can be easy. ‘His brown eyes dozed off’ is an example. Or ‘“I'll always be with you, John” said Jack. I don't suggest that you give out internal stuff, like worries and secrets in the intro itself. Perhaps you could go forward a bit more and then do it. You could give small clues in the intro.
I like to refer to past experiences at certain points in the story. i use all the senses, i particularly like to use the sense of smell. Smelling coffee, for example, could remind your protaganist of his alcoholic father and how he would try to make him coffee when he was drunk. I believe you can drop some real nuggets into this and dont need to go into detail. A simple line like this can explain why your hero is tea total without having to go into clumsy reasons. I agree with Timewalker, drip feed the 'reveal' of your character throughout the story
Also, weigh just how important particular details are to your story. Hair style, physical build, etc. Many readers paint their own picture of a character and often ignore the physical details. If you're talking about things like, Joe hates artificial sweetener, played frisbee in college and is a sucker for red-heads, then just ease those kinds of details into the story. That's part of character development. Let your readers go on the journey with Joe and learn about him as they do.
