Writers, send your prologue/first chapter to FtQ for a “flogging” critique. Email as an attachment. In your email, include your name, permission to use the first page, and, if it’s okay, permission to post the rest of the prologue/chapter.
Many of the folks who utilize BookBub are self-published, and because we hear over and over the need for self-published authors to have their work edited, it’s educational to take a hard look at their first pages. A poll follows concerning the need for an editor.
When you evaluate today’s opening page, consider how well it uses elements from the checklist of first-page ingredients from my book, Mastering the Craft of Compelling Storytelling.
Donald Maass, literary agent and author of many books on writing, says, “Independent editor Ray Rhamey’s first-page checklist is an excellent yardstick for measuring what makes openings interesting.”
A First-page Checklist
- It begins to engage the reader with the character
- Something is wrong/goes wrong or challenges the character
- The character desires something.
- The character takes action. Can be internal or external action: thoughts, deeds, emotions. This does NOT include musing about whatever.
- 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.
- The one thing it must do: raise a story question.
Next are the first 17 manuscript lines of the first chapter of Give It Back. A poll follows the opening page below. Should this author have hired an editor?
My phone vibrates, and my arm swings out, propelling my glass to the floor. The shatter echoes throughout my apartment as red wine seeps along the grout lines of the kitchen tiles. It looks just like the blood that pours from the victims’ bodies when I force my blade into their skin. I grab a towel to stop the wine from reaching my beige carpet in the next room. My eyes move back to my phone. Guilt slithers through me as my sister’s name flickers on the screen. I should’ve called, asked her how she’s doing.
“Lorraine,” I say. “How are you?” There’s silence. “Lorraine?”
“Hi, El.” She’s breathing deeply on the other end.
I tiptoe around the kitchen bar to avoid stepping on the shards of glass and slicing up my bare feet. “Are you okay?” I ask. Another pause. “Can you hear me?”
“I need you.”
I swallow hard, my eyes dashing around as though I’ll find an excuse in my apartment. “The au pair is still there, right? The one from London?” This could be a replay of the night she called to tell me what the doctor had said. I’ve known about her diagnosis for eight months, and I haven’t visited her once. A good sister would’ve made the short flight from San Diego to Seattle to support her, but I haven’t.
“Yeah. She’s here.”
You can turn the page and read more here. Did this writer need an editor? My notes:
This novel 4.1 stars on Amazon. I had mixed reactions to this opening page. I thought the part about slipping her knife into “the” victims was a fun tease—I think it’s clear that it’s not “my” victims, which suggests some kind of forensic work.
That starts some tension, and there is character tension brought in by her avoidance response to hearing from her ill sister. Trouble in that relationship. A story question rises: what is that trouble? And what is wrong with the sister that’s strong enough to motivate her to call her estranged sister?
But then there are issues with the writing that are turnoffs for me. The overwriting inherent in the description of her tiptoeing around the kitchen, action description that is completely unnecessary. And then her eyes do things that just can’t happen, a pet peeve of mine—they move to her phone, they dash around. Gazes do those things, not eyes. So, with that and the low level of tension, this was a pass for me. But it was close. Your thoughts?
Cover critique
A key element in cover design is how well it communicates in the thumbnail size you see on sites such as Amazon. This one doesn’t hold up well, does it? It’s darky, so dark that you can’t make out what is there other than some gloomy gray clouds. There’s a field of something, but it’s hard to see what it is. And what does it have to do with the “It” in the title? There’s no clue to story here, either in the title and cover art. Lastly, the author name is way too faint and small. Be proud of what you’ve written, put you name out there with it. What do you think?
My books. You can read sample chapters and learn more about the books here.
Writing Craft Mastering the Craft of Compelling Storytelling
Mystery (coming of age) The Summer Boy
Science Fiction Gundown Free ebooks.