Story ideas??

Hi, for English language I have to write 3 paragraphs for the start of a horror/gothic story. Need some ideas on a story line please
Any ideas will help thanks

Have you been studying the common themes of gothic stories? You should take inspiration from those being trapped in a mysterious house is often a common thread, so perhaps something to do with that, or you could write it as if it's in the Victorian period

Maybe you could begin it in medias res, so write something scary that happens first eg someone getting murdered/ committing suicide or something like that then go back and explain how they got there.

Hi, for English language I have to write 3 paragraphs for the start of a horror/gothic story. Need some ideas on a story line please
Any ideas will help thanks

A good structure for any story, I've found, is WHO-WHAT-WHERE (not, necessarily, in that order).

Here are 3 specimens:-

1. Who= a solitary security guard.
What= he hears a strange sound & investigates its source.
Where= on night-duty in a deserted warehouse on the isle of Dogs.

2. Who= 2 teenage girls
What= on their way back from a party, giggling and a bit tipsy
Where= taking a detour home through some woodland.

3. Who= the prime minister
What= on his way to a function in a chauffeur-driven car, the doors jam and the car breaks down in a rough area.
Where=in the car, in said area.

Hope this gets you thinking (:

Ah okay, so for a gothic/horror story it could be:

Who: A girl
What: Her car brakes down so she goes to the closest house which is an abandoned house, where she gets murdered
Where: Abandoned house

Would that work?

Her being murdered would be a little anticlimactic

Maybe she has a friend who's murdered. The main character surviving but mentally scarred tends to make a good 'conclusion' as such.

But since it's only the first 3 paragraphs you're writing, you're really just setting the atmosphere...

Yeah I know what you mean :/

So in the 3 paragraphs would I include how the friend is murdered or just set the idea that she might die?

I'd have some kind of threat implied.

Assuming these are long paragraphs, this is what I'd do:

~ First paragraph would be, say, the arrival. What they see. The dark night around them, distant sounds - or complete silence.

~ Second might be something about them. Some kind of internal monologue - or dialogue - about how and why they got there (keep it vague, amnesic, don't want to kill the mood) and why they need to go in (purpose is good for pedantic readers)

~ Third would be around their entrance to the building (personally, I think schools make very good settings, especially for the descriptive first paragraph which could be expanded upon here), maybe there's a dark shadow, a face in the window... then I'd end that paragraph with them entering the blackness...