A reminder of why we do this
Top literary agent Molly Friedrich said in an interview,
“I'm looking for the first page to be good. Then I'm looking for the second page to also be good. Really! The first page has to be good so that I will go to the second page and the third and the fourth. The main thing I look for is immediate great writing.”
My book, Flogging the Quill, Crafting a Novel that Sells, is now available for pre-order at Amazon.com. I should be printing and shipping within in about 3 weeks, and early orders will be tremendously helpful.The Flogometer challenge: can you craft a first page that compels me to turn to the next page? Caveat: Please keep in mind that this is entirely subjective.
Note: all the Flogometer posts are here.
What's a first page in publishingland? In a properly formatted novel manuscript (double-spaced, 1-inch margins, 12-point type, etc.) there should be about 16 lines on the first page (first pages of chapters/prologues start about 1/3 of the way down the page). Directions for submissions are below.
Some homework. Before sending your novel's opening, you might want to read these two FtQ posts: Story as River and Kitty-cats in Action. That'll tell you where I'm coming from, and might prompt a little rethinking of your narrative.
Steven’s first 16 lines:
Didn’t capture meConnection Established
A man with a gruff voice answers “Yeah?” On the other line a female speaks in a serious tone. “Is the connection secured?”
“Yes” Replied the man
“We found him.” Said the woman
“Are you sure? What is his name?” Asks the man.
“Rayel, Sir” Answers the woman
“Last name?”
“He doesn’t have one Sir. Foster Child”
The man types a command into the terminal next to him. “Are you sure? His grades are mediocre, and according to his file, he hasn’t even discovered his abilities yet.” Said the man in shock.
“I’m sure. With the right training, he will be unstoppable.” Replied the woman
“If your right, I’m sure glad he’s on our side…”
“He’s on his way” Said the woman
Connection Terminated
I’m afraid that these anonymous voices dispensing information didn’t provoke enough curiosity in me to move on. That, plus numerous craft shortcomings, prevented a page turn. There are a number of punctuation problems, in particular, that look like the writer is assuming his word processor knows what it’s doing. I know that Microsoft Word will, after a sentence ending with a quotation mark, assume that the next word starts a new sentence and thus capitalizes it. You need to override that. In this case, most of these sentences should have had a comma before the quote mark and dialogue tags such as “said” and “answered” should not be capitalized—or, in some cases, not there at all. Notes:
Connection Established
A man with a gruff voice answers, “Yeah?” font color="blue">(Missing comma.)
On the other line a female speaks in a serious tone. “Is the connection secured?” (This should have been a separate paragraph. “Serious tone” is telling, not showing. Though showing is hard to do with no point-of-view character and voices alone.)
“Yes,”
Repliedreplies the man. (Craft issues: missing comma after “Yes,” missing period. Shift from present tense to past tense. And I’m one of those who advocate using said 99% of the time rather than alternatives such as “replied” and “asked.”)“We found him,”
Saidsays the woman . (Should have been a comma at end of dialogue, change in tense from present to past (said versus says), period missing.)“Are you sure? What is his name?”
Aasks the man. (Tense hops back to present)“Rayel, Sir,”
Aanswers the woman. (should have been a comma at end of dialogue, capitalization error, period missing.)“Last name?”
“He doesn’t have one, Sir. Foster Child.” (should have been a comma at end of dialogue, period missing.)
The man types a command into the terminal next to him. “Are you sure? His grades are mediocre, and according to his file, he hasn’t even discovered his abilities yet.”
Saidsays the man in shock. (The end of this says that the man is in shock, not that he is shocked by the information he receives. And it’s more “telling.” Verb tense shift again.)“I’m sure. With the right training, he will be unstoppable.”
Repliedreplies the woman. (Capitalization error, shift in tense back to past, missing period.)“If
youryou’re right, I’m sure glad he’s on our side…”“He’s on his way,”
Saidsays the woman. Missing comma, capitalization error, missing period, shift in tense back to past.)Connection Terminated
A manuscript peppered with errors such as these will be instantly rejected. This writer needs to learn a great deal about punctuation—the rest of the narrative had the same problems, plus more “telling.” I feel that the writer has a good story to tell, and should keep working on it, but needs to acquire basic grammar skills before what’s on the page will begin to approach publishable.
Steve, you’re doing the right things—you’re writing, and you’re asking for fresh eyes.
Comments, anyone?
For what it’s worth.
Ray
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Public floggings available. If I can post it here,
- send 1st chapter or prologue plus 1st chapter as an attachment (cutting and pasting and reformatting from an email is a time-consuming pain) and I'll critique the first couple of pages.
- Please format your submission as specified at the front of this post.
- Please include in your email permission to post it on FtQ.
- And, optionally, permission to use it as an example in a book if that's okay.
- If you’re in a hurry, I’ve done “private floggings,” $50 for a first chapter.
- If you rewrite while you wait you turn, it’s okay with me to update the submission.
© 2009 Ray Rhamey
It's apparent from the "Connection Established/Terminated" note that we're seeing some sort of transcript, not actual narrative. I have two suggestions for how to take it: show us the text as an actual transcript, the way some writers will insert a newspaper "clipping" or diary entry, and cut the narrative attempts altogether so we "get" there's supposed to be distance,
OR
start with a close POV of something more active. (I recommend this one. *G*)
Ray already spoke of the grammatical issues but don't let that stop you - you can learn those and always make sure to have a beta reader look over your manuscript before you send it out - this is an easily overcome obstacle!
You raise some good story questions and I'd be curious who the boy is, why they want him - who they are! so do keep at it. :)
Posted by: Jess | March 16, 2009 at 08:53 AM
First thing I thought was that it sounded exactly like the beginning of the Matrix. Very close actually.
Posted by: Jeremiah | March 16, 2009 at 09:11 AM
I'm afraid that this didn't hook me. The unnamed people didn't have enough pep on the page to inspire me to like or hate them. The lack of last name didn't ring true to me. The fact that the boy will be trained and become unstoppable suggested to me that this might be a Gary Stu or any number of tropes (the dog-man with a collar, Bourne, etc.) I'm hungry for specifics that will give me a sense of place and an idea of why I should care about the boy.
In fact, this connects with Query Shark comments. The agent consistently hungers for specific, rather than generic, information in the query letters to draw her in before she'll take a look. I feel strongly that the same holds true for opening paragraphs.
Posted by: Kami | March 17, 2009 at 11:55 AM