Narrate introduction to tale in ideal novel (6)
I believe the answer is:
detail
'narrate' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'introduction to tale in ideal novel' is the wordplay.
'introduction to' indicates taking the first letters (I've seen 'introductions to' mean this).
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'novel' indicates anagramming the letters.
The first letter of 'tale' is 't'.
'ideal' anagrammed gives 'deail'.
't' inserted within 'deail' is 'DETAIL'.
(Other definitions for detail that I've seen before include "Factor" , "A piece of information, may be minor" , "Individual fact or feature, may be unimportant" , "Tailed into particulars" , "Describe fully, give particulars of" .)