Welcome MMS!
(mandatory gunshot wound as demanded
).
There's some flexibility as to where you start
telling your story, but where it starts chronologically is just before the first thing happens to change a main character's life. The 'just before' is usually the scene that explains what the character was doing before its life changed, and why that event was so important.
In film noir mysteries the main character is often first found in his office, poring over unpaid bills. This motivates him to accept a case that he otherwise wouldn't (which is the
inciting event that changes his life). In my current WIP, the story starts with the main character -- a social worker -- knocking at the door of a house with an abused child, and getting no answer. The knocking is her ordinary life; the lack of answer is what begins to trigger the extraordinary events.
So if finding the box is the inciting event that changes Mark's life, then chronologically, the story starts just before Mark comes to possess the box. It shows what sort of life Mark had before the box came into his possession, and why that was important to him. It will also lead into why he was digging in the first place. E.g.
Mark is digging out a new potato-patch after his step-brother has beaten him. He's breaking clay with a mattock, his hands are blistered and he's feeling sorry for himself. We learn that Mark's mother remarried, making him a stepchild, but then she died. His step-family no longer want him, and he dreams of getting out -- but he's under-age and has no money.
Mark's life changes when he finds the box, because it's full of old war medals, and a diary that talks about a stolen army payroll that's hidden somewhere near the property. But from the diary Mark also discovers that his step-father was complicit in the theft, may have murdered the man who owned the box, and that his own life may be in jeapordy.
The main character must be in a
situation where the inciting event is important. The inciting event should create an important
goal for the main character, but the situation should somehow also bring in
opposition to that goal and the risk of
disaster.
When you can introduce an interesting character in an interesting situation, and throw in a surprising inciting event that triggers the tension of opposition and the threat of disaster then your reader will be hooked!
I believe that your question about the box's history actually relates to
backstory -- plot background that precedes the inciting event. You can do a few things with backstory: 1) mention it in dialogue or gloss it in narrative; 2) flash back to it; or 3) put it in prologue. If you open with backstory then you're prologuing it. In published fiction a prologue is most often used when: a) it's interesting; b) it reveals something that the audience will later need to know; and c) the audience might not believe it if you mention it later on. By contrast, a flashback is most often used when: a) it's interesting; b) it reveals something that the audience needs to know; and c) if you don't flash-back at that point, one of your characters will seem to be acting out of character.
The rest of the time, backstory is normally salted into dialogue or narrative (which is what I did with Mark's backstory above -- have him reflect on his life while he's miserably digging a tater-patch; the box's backstory appears in the diary as per your idea).
Hope this helps (and that your wound heals cleanly
).
Connor! I will leave it to Ruv Draba to both shoot you and provide a cogent response, but I wanted to say welcome to the boards.
