Submissions Welcome. If you’d like a fresh look at your opening chapter or prologue, please email your submission to me re the directions at the bottom of this post.
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 or 17 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—they include a request to post the rest of the chapter, but that’s optional.
A word about the line-editing in these posts: it’s “one-pass” editing, and I don’t try to address everything, which is why I appreciate the comments from the FtQ tribe. In a paid edit, I go through each manuscript three times.
Before you rip into today’s submission, consider this checklist of first-page ingredients from my book, Mastering the Craft of Compelling Storytelling. While it's not a requirement that all of these elements must be on the first page, they can be, and I think you have the best chance of hooking a reader if they are.
Download a free PDF copy here.
Were I you, I'd examine my first page in the light of this list before submitting to the Flogometer. I use it on my own work.
A First-page Checklist
- It begins engaging the reader with the character
- Something is happening. On a first page, this does NOT include a character musing about whatever.
- The character desires something.
- The character does something.
- There’s enough of a setting to orient the reader as to where things are happening.
- It happens in the NOW of the story.
- Backstory? What backstory? We’re in the NOW of the story.
- Set-up? What set-up? We’re in the NOW of the story.
- What happens raises a story question.
Caveat: a strong first-person voice with the right content can raise powerful story questions and create page turns without doing all of the above. A recent submission worked wonderfully well and didn't deal with five of the things in the checklist.
Also, if you think about it, the same checklist should apply to the page where you introduce an antagonist.
Ashleigh sends the first chapter of a science fiction novel, When We Was A Child . The rest follows the break.
Flesh.
My leg slices through the air and slams into flesh. His flesh. Right in his umbilical hole, right where the shade sneaks through generation after generation. My foot goes numb from the force and he gasps and begs me to stop. But I can't.
Don’t! I scream at her.
But she does. My leg, an identical leg to my right and three more to my left pull back and shoot forward, in his thigh, in his arm, in his face. His third Vice President, a clone like I am, collapses on the ground in front of me. Each blow makes me dread her more.
"No more. Please!" he says.
He doesn’t fight back; it doesn’t seem to occur to him to even try. The corners of my mouth sag, and a tear slides down my cheek. Cold anger, and hot sadness swirl and bang inside me, they team together against the emotion that is truly mine. Fear. My arm tenses.
Calm down, President Prodida.
She can’t hear me, I’m trapped in my own mind. My sinuses burn and tears push at the sides of my eyeballs, but she won't let another tear fall. Soggy grass mixed with dark red gore lounges on the cliff of meat that used to be his brow and slides down when he looks up at me. One of his eyes squint, and the other is swollen shut. His lip trembles.
This opening page starts out with a bang, good writing, and strong voice. There’s conflict, and a character that seems troubled. But troubled by what? For this reader, there were clarity issues. I had to read it more than once to figure out what was going on. Same went for the rest of the chapter. I understand the motive to not reveal too much, to keep mystery going, but if the narrative is too terse and lacking in clues and concrete images, there are readers you will leave behind. For me, there were too many clarity and staging issues to want to continue. That does not mean that there isn’t a compelling story here—in fact, the world interests me quite a lot. But being unable to see or understand it adequately stopped me here. Notes:
Flesh. I would delete this for a single reason—it takes up a line of next without contributing much, and it keeps what I think is a very valuable line off the first page. I’ll show that at the end.
My leg slices through the air and slams into flesh. His flesh. Right in his umbilical hole, right where the shade sneaks through generation after generation. My foot goes numb from the force and he gasps and begs me to stop. But I can't. No need for repetition that slows the narrative, the next sentence identifies the male nature of the victim. The “shade” line refers to something I don’t know and raises an information question (as opposed to a story question), but I’m willing, as a reader, to let that go for moment if it’s clarified soon—but it isn’t, not in the rest of the chapter.
Don’t! I scream at her. I assume that this is thought. Problem: I don’t know who “here” is. A later paragraph seems to identify “her” as President Prodida. I would use the name here. More than that, this is an opportunity, especially with the previous line telling us that the kicker can’t stop. If I would you, I would expand this line to include the fact that the kicker is being controlled. Thoughstarter: Don’t! I scream at President Prodida. Stop! I scream at her to stop controlling me.
But she does. My leg, an identical leg to my right and three more to my left pull back and shoot forward, in his thigh, in his arm, in his face. His third Vice President, a clone like I am, collapses on the ground in front of me. Each blow makes me dread her more. I found this confusing and difficult to parse. Expanding it would help. If there are four clones of her also kicking, please show us enough to see it. I wonder about the kicks landing “in” his thigh, arm, etc. Wouldn’t they hit, instead? How to they go into his body parts? The reference to “His” was also confusing because the reference to the controller so far has been to a female, and the later narrative also seems to say that the President is female. So who is this “his” referred to here?
"No more. Please!" he says.
He doesn’t fight back; it doesn’t seem to occur to him to even try. The corners of my mouth sag, and a tear slides down my cheek. Cold anger, and hot sadness swirl and bang inside me, they team together against the emotion that is truly mine. Fear. My arm tenses.
Calm down, President Prodida.
She can’t hear me, I’m trapped in my own mind. My sinuses burn and tears push at the sides of my eyeballs, but she won't let another tear fall. Soggy grass mixed with dark red gore lounges on the cliff of meat that used to be his brow and slides down when he looks up at me. One of his eyes squints, and the other is swollen shut. His lip trembles. How did grass get on his brow? He falls, and it seems that it must be on his back. He speaks to her, and she sees the grass on his brow, which must face up. The grass also has to be cut, otherwise it can’t slide down when he lifts his head. The staging here is not clear at all to me.
Here’s the line from the next page that I would include because it helped me understand that the character is being controlled. It was a separate paragraph of thought: Don't look at me like that. I'm not doing this, it's not me. It’s not me.
Your thoughts?
For what it’s worth.
Ray
Submitting to the Flogometer:
Email the following in an attachment (.doc, .docx, or .rtf preferred, no PDFs):
- your title
- your complete 1st chapter or prologue plus 1st chapter
- Please include in your email permission to post it on FtQ. Note: I’m adding a copyright notice for the writer at the end of the post. I’ll use just the first name unless I’m told I can use the full name.
- Also, please tell me if it’s okay to post the rest of the chapter so people can turn the page.
- And, optionally, include your permission to use it as an example in a book on writing craft 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 for your turn, it’s okay with me to update the submission.
Were I you, I'd examine my first page in the light of the first-page checklist before submitting to the Flogometer.
Flogging the Quill © 2016 Ray Rhamey, prologue and chapter © 2016 by Fluidity
Continued:
. . . Don't look at me like that. I'm not doing this, it's not me. It’s not me.
Those three words repeat in my head, but I don’t feel any less responsible. I wanted him to hurt. So much. Maybe I’m just like her. My fist, aching and red with his blood – or my blood – rams into his ear, and his head snaps to the side. The grass splats on the sidewalk, crimson pooling from under it and nausea roils in my stomach.
"You deserve this. Abomination." my voice says.
He deserves something, but not this. He looks at me again, his face distorted in patterns of shadow, light, and abuse. My eyes glare at his that plead for mercy, and I’m relieved when his neck muscles give out and his head clunks to the ground. I stare at him, ashamed that I’m glad to be rid of his accusing gaze.
That’s enough, leave him alone!
Blood trickles out of his mouth, and he doesn't move. My heart pounds so loud it wobbles my eyeballs, but I move forward in the fuzzy morning, because whether I see or not doesn't matter. President Prodida controls me; she controls all four of us. My foot nudges him. Nothing. My foot nudges him harder, and his flesh moves willingly, like it fell off the bone. But still, he doesn't move.
"Gods." My voice says. "Oh, Gods."
Try again. Try. Again.
My fingers clench in and out of fists, trying to slow the adrenaline that races up and down my body.
My foot pushes him so hard he rolls on his side. Moments pass, then he coughs and groans, and tugs his over-wear up. His beneath-wear is blue with a transparent circle of fabric in the middle of his stomach. My senses freeze as I gape at the skin that has no hole.
Oh, no.
My feet trip over one another and my back crashes into a Reuse bin behind me.
"I won't tell anyone." he gasps out, crying and drooling like a liveborn. His sobbing pierces into my brain, and clouds the world until only my arm, feeling for the edge of the bin, exists.
My body moves to the left, and the world comes crashing back when I see the girl peeking out from a window.
Hurry, President Prodida!
Though it’s no use, the girl’s probably been there the entire time.
My fingers find the smooth seam of the massive bin, and as my body turns away, my eyes glance back. Into the darkness, not at him. But I see him anyway, he’s still. I feel hollow, as my hip sockets churn, and run me far away.
She'll report you.