1st Line; 1st Page; 1st Chapter – the dos & the don’ts

Morning everyone, 

Today I wanted to talk about first pages, first chapters and prologues.

As I’m sure all of you have heard time and again getting, first line, pages and chapters is vital, but having said that, based on a few first pages I’ve recently received, and follow-up emails, I don’t think people are getting exactly why.

So I’m going to break it down for you.

But before I do that, I wanted to go over some ‘rules’ – and when I say rules, I mean what is standard for most agents/editors. Please ALWAYS read submission guidelines and don’t drift from them. We are individuals and therefore we each do like things a little differently.

1. Unless otherwise stated, if you have a prologue, then THAT is your first chapter. Simply NOT calling it a chapter when it makes up your manuscript word-count and story-line does not negate the need to send this as a first chapter.

2. If your first chapter is all back-story, re-write it or filter the information through the novel. Don’t info-dump the reader with details that mean nothing to the reader.

3. If your BETA readers / CP partners /Agent / Editor writes back with notes like “Too much info-dump” “Too much exposition” “How is the first chapter relevant to the following chapters?” or similar, don’t write a massive email back explaining that as soon as the reader gets to chapters 3/4/5 it’ll all make sense. The reason? The reader is already deciding NOT to get to chapters 3/4/5.

4. Don’t argue with your reading partners. Yes ask questions if something isn’t clear, but asking questions does not include becoming defensive or rude/abusive.

5. If you don’t agree, that’s OK – it’s your baby and you need to be happy with the end product.

6. Remember to thank those assisting you, even if you’ve paid them for their time, be respectful.

Now on to the Big Three

Prologues:

OK, I’m going to admit it. On the whole, I’m not a fan of prologues. Having said that, there is a case to be made for a prologue, for example, if you are creating your own world, or doing a massive re-tell that needs some explaining, I’ll grant that a prologue could be handy. If that is the case, KEEP IT SHORT – seriously – more than 500 words and it’s too much.

I would also recommend two things:

• Rename it – perhaps call it Chapter #0 or get creative, something like a memoir, or diary entry. For example, if you’re writing a romance, or a thriller, or a mystery, or a fantasy, you could start off with lines like: –

“I’m writing this because I don’t know if I will ever have the opportunity to tell anyone my story, and my story must be told, for this world I have found myself in is…”

• Stick to the MAIN topic and character(s). Don’t info-dump. Remember the reader doesn’t know your world/characters and therefore is not invested in it.

• After you’ve finished, and edited, and re-read it, and had feedback from your BETA’s, see if indeed it is simply Chapter one an not a prologue.

First Pages:

The first line of the first paragraph of the first page of the first chapter should IDEALLY be a stopper. It isn’t always, and sometimes not matter how hard you try, that damned first line eludes you. It’s OK if it’s not but it would be great if it was. If your first line is really bothering you then it will likely do the same to another reader. I would recommend studying those who know how to do this. A great starting point is reading the first line(s) of your favourite authors. I would also recommend these two pages from Writers Digest:

http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/famous-first-lines-learn-how-to-start-a-novel

http://www.writersdigest.com/online-editor/7-ways-to-create-a-killer-opening-line-for-your-novel

First Paragraphs

While the first line is important, a lot can be forgiven if the first paragraph (or maybe two), actively catches the readers imagination. Contrary to popular belief, it does not have to have someone talking, though this works very well also. Nor does it have to have the name of the main character; though by the end of page-1 you need to have the main character’s name introduced.

Things to aim for in first paragraphs:

• Some description/detail without going overboard. Examples of this might be: – “Mother always told us to never go out on the moors after ten at night, because that’s when he hunted. Sadly, my brother Jim didn’t listen, and Mother was right” – or perhaps, “I always felt sick on the first day of school, but this year, it was a new school, in a new town, and I was about ready to throw up last nights pea-soup all over my new bottle-green school uniform.”
• Bring in your main character. Use their name and a personal character trait, a physical feature or quirkiness unique to the character. Something like: – “Mum and dad must have thought it clever to call me Ophelia. I hated the name. And I hated it even more when most of my school friends had read Macbeth. Last year, super-perfect-sun-bleached-blond Sally started calling me ‘crazy-fee,’ and it didn’t help that my twin brother’s name was Malcolm and our uncle Mike was the town drunk.”
• Give us a location, country, period to grasp on to. “This can be as simple as: – “Back in the 1980s when my parents were teenagers, they didn’t have mobile phones or google. I really don’t know how teenagers talked to each other back then. I mean, I’d die without my Facebook and Twitter friends, I mean, we live in the middle of frigging nowhere, what did people do thirty years ago anyway?” Note how I’ve used “I mean” twice? I’m not only setting the period and the age of my MC but also the way they talk.

Things to avoid in first paragraphs:

There are many things to avoid. But let’s deal with just two or three for now.

• Droning on and on. By this I mean, yes we want to know who the MC is and where they live and in which period/world they are but don’t give us 3-5 paragraphs of detail. Remember this is fiction and you must engage the reader.
• Forcing the main characters name. Yes we want to know who the MC is but it must be natural. I’ve seen/read pages with lines like:

“How’s the fishing Charlie?” asked Charlie’s best friend Pete. A best friend will rarely add a name in their comment/question to their mate. They will simply ask “How’s the fishing?” You can use their name in a different way, for example. Someone was shouting “Over here,” but the band was playing too loudly and I couldn’t make out where the voice was coming from. I looked around when I heard the second, “Hey, here, here,” and saw an arm waving above the bobbing heads. I stood on a chair looking for the voice, hoping it was my mate Pete when I heard him shout, “Charlie!” Pete was now waving with both hands. I smiled and waved back, jumped off the chair and made my way through the crowd.

• Creating disbelief. This one is harder to explain but think of it this way. You are creating a world for the reader to get lost in, what you don’t want is to have that world crumble before the reader is fully invested.  Examples of this would be inconsistency such as forgetting the spelling of a characters name, or their description varying. Other examples would be changing the characters ‘voice’ without a valid reason, not remaining in the setting (think period/historical) and jumping too fast from one character to another without enough time for the reader to fully immerse themselves in this new world.

There are of course many other issues. Things like poor spelling or using the wrong word, pour, poor; pore is a good example as is weather, whether and wether. Other issues include changing tense or really bad grammatical errors and something difficult to explain yet almost instantly recognisable, failing on the tone and rhythm of the pages.

First pages:

I am not going to list all the dos and don’ts of first pages as a lot has to do with the category and genre you are writing in. Having said that, the purpose of the first chapter, regardless of category and genre is to do the following:

1. introduce the main character
2. creating the world/setting
3. set the theme
4. show your voice as a writer and the MC’s voice
5. seduce and entice the reader to keep reading

What not to do.

1. waste precious page real estate on back story
2. introduce a shopping list of characters (*caveat, this can be done by the skilled, those who know that fine line between exposition, detail and introduction)
3. blabber on and on about nothing
4. start with your MC in the shower,
5. getting out of the shower,
6. looking at themselves in the mirror,
7. asleep,
8. waking up,
9. having a dream/nightmare,
10. watching/describing the weather,
11. starting with dialogue for the sake of not knowing where to start your story and thinking, “this’ll do as a starting point,”
12. talking to themselves or in third person (*caveat, unless its done really well and forms part of the MC character/story-line, personality)
13. expecting people have read your prologue (many will not, especially if its longer than one page) and assuming the reader knows your MC.

Again, there are a lot of other things to consider, and even within the “what not to do” list, I can think of several extraordinary novels that begin with one or more of the above. However, they are exceptions because they either break the rules (in a good way) or they play on an idea in a way that is unique and thrilling. For most of us mere morals, we have to work harder to find our originality.

And one other thing, which is why I decided to write this post, don’t say things like “WAIT FOR IT” when an editor or CP partner says “it took too long to get to the real story, the main character” (etc.), because frankly, we readers are fickle and impatient and we hate to even wait for a home delivery pizza… therefore we will not wait for the story to develop, or worse, start on page 50. If that’s where it starts, you need to pretty much cut 48-49 pages.

And because I happen to think Writers Digest has some exceptional advice for writers, I would recommend reading: http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/there-are-no-rules/write-fiction-that-grabs-readers-from-page-one