Perfecting your first three chapters to send to an agent (or publisher) can be a long and frustrating process. You’ve probably heard that a lot rides on those first three chapters because they’re your first impression on your reader. They are, and those chapters should be your best work. But to someone reading through your submission, what matters is the first page, and more specifically, the first paragraph. Most agents and publishers won’t read past the first page. They can tell by your first page if you are going to be able to hold their interest or not. At many writing conferences, there are events where a panel of agents or publishers listen to people read the first page of a manuscript, and they raise their hand when they would stop reading. That’s a lot of pressure on your opening! Having read through hundreds of submissions myself, I can attest to the fact that I rarely read a person’s full three chapters. More often than not, I’m simply not hooked or invested in what’s happening. It’s not like I open a manuscript with the intention of not reading it. I want to read every word, but so often the writing just isn’t there. So, here are some things to keep in mind as you write your opening paragraph and page. 1. Start with Conflict I was going to say start with action, but not every story needs to start with action, but all stories should start with conflict. Or, at least, get to the conflict pretty quickly. If your story starts slow and drones on about the world, the character’s backstory, or what his morning routine is, that won’t get you far with a reader. Readers want to be brought into a situation that’s rife with tension, be it physical, emotional, or spiritual. They need something or someone to be invested in or sympathetic/empathetic toward. In other words, there needs to be an emotional connection. I’ve read too many submissions that make me feel “meh.” I don’t care about Mr. Jones’s morning walk, unless he uses his morning walk every day as a cover up to meet with criminals from the Black Market. Now that is a situation ready to explode with conflict. 2. Describe don’t Dump I’m sure you’ve heard of the infamous info dump. Please don’t do it. I’ve opened many submissions that start with long paragraphs trying to set up the story or tell about a character’s past. This is basically a writer’s way of saying, “Hey reader, I don’t think you’re smart enough to understand this wonderfully complex world and story of mine, so let me break it down for you into bite sized pieces.” No reader wants to be spoon fed. You should describe only what’s needed for immediate understanding. Backstory shouldn’t play a role until later on in the story. The beginning can give hints of the past, but it should be focused on launching into the story that’s happening now. This gets into the whole “show, don’t tell” rule. Info dumping is telling your reader everything he needs to know. You’re telling him the context. Well-crafted description shows the reader what’s happening using the five senses. He becomes a participant, not an observer in the story. Your opening should invite the reader into your world, and every word after needs to convince him to stay. “Don’t tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.” -Anton Chekhov 3. Stay away from Clichés Most of us know better than to start with, “It was a dark and stormy night.” However, there are plenty of clichés (tropes and phrases/expressions) that permeate the writing world, and it’s easy to fall back on them. Being unoriginal takes little effort. Coming up with something new and fresh is hard work. The “chosen one” trope is a common cliché in fantasy where the main character is chosen or destined to save the world. Yes, the entire world rests on the shoulders of this insecure teen just trying to find his way in this world. This is not to say that you can’t use tropes and clichés, just be sure to spin them in your own creative way. The goal is to not be too predictable. Readers want an adventure with lots of twists and turns, not a watered-down, average joe tale. If you want some more info on clichés to avoid check out this article on NY Book Editors. 4. First Words Matter Dialogue should come in pretty quickly in your story. It reveals a lot about your characters and how they interact with each other. What they say speaks to their personalities, beliefs, backgrounds, etc. If the first words your character says are bland and stilted, you’ve lost the reader. Dialogue should help your story come alive. It should create dynamics on the page and sound authentic to the people speaking. Bad dialogue is cringy and the fastest way to let your story fall flat. Don’t take those first words lightly. Your choices should be intentional. If a character speaks with a lisp or stutters, be sure there’s a reason for it. If another character swears, be sure it’s necessary. It’s easy to think that because we listen to people speak all the time, we know how dialogue works on the page. It’s different than real-life, and sometimes we need to break the rules to make it flow better in our fiction. There is so much more to say about openings, but if you focus on the few things I’ve mentioned here, you’re already four steps ahead of most other manuscript submissions. Hook the reader with your first sentence and keep him wanting more. Start with the real story, the story that’s happening now, and put the reader right in the middle of it as an active participant. Make sure you keep things fresh and original, and let the dialogue sing on the page. So, sink or swim? Perhaps Dory from Finding Nemo says it best: “Just keep swimming.” Or, in our case: “Just keep writing.”
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When I first began as an intern with a literary agency, I was thrilled to get to look through the submissions inbox. I was tasked with the ultimate quest: find the diamond in the rough. The gem among rocks and stones. It was a scavenger hunt extraordinaire. Being a writer myself, the very notion of reading through other writers' manuscripts was a dream come true. But I quickly realized that I needed some new glasses, not because I couldn't see well enough to read, but because mine were rose-tinted and not at all prepared for the reality of the slush pile. "For every ten submissions you read, you might find one good one," Cyle Young told me when I first started working with him. That may not seem like much of a surprise, but when the agency receives hundreds of submissions, that number starts to feel pretty discouraging. Yes, that's right. I get discouraged by that. It's so hard sending rejections to writers and authors. We agents, junior agents, and interns want you to succeed, but I know it may not seem like it when the form rejections keep coming in one after another. So what makes a diamond in the rough? Here are a few tips on making your submission stand out among the masses. 1. Write Well (Please!!!) I know this is a given, but you have no idea how many submissions I've read where the writer simply doesn't understand the basics of the English language or storytelling. I've seen stream of consciousness with no punctuation or paragraph breaks. I've seen cringy cliches and blocks of dense prose with no dialogue (help!). I've seen typos and verb tense switches. And then, just when I think I've seen it all, something else pops into my inbox that makes me say, "Well, that's new." And not in a good way. So please, read your work carefully and have several people who aren't your mom or best friend take a look at it. All I ask is that you hook me from line one and take me on an adventure with complex people struggling through conflict toward change. No need to show off with fancy prose or rip off every classic that you know. Be authentic and make me care about your story. For more tips on grabbing a slush pile reader's attention check out this post on Shimmer Magazine's site. 2. Don't Tell Me Yours is a Future Bestseller Of course, you should have some confidence in your abilities as a writer, but please, none of that "my book will sell millions and you'd be stupid not to take it." Seriously, people say this stuff. Let the writing speak for itself. The whole "my book is the next Harry Potter" is not going to fly. Arrogance gets you nowhere with agents. There's room for improvement in every writer. If you need to, repeat Ernest Hemingway's words to yourself every morning: "We are all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master." Lead with that. "I am an apprentice." "I am a quick learner." "I am teachable." These are the things that show an agent you're easy to work with and ready to do the hard work to get published. Your writing may be good, but being willing to learn will make you a great writer. 3. Platform: Have Something! Saying you don't have platform basically tells an agent that you have no readership and no audience. Your writing may be excellent, but nothing sells without an audience. Yes, platform building is hard work, and we all just want to sit inside away from people and write. I get it. It's scary to put yourself out there, but you owe it to your readers. They don't know it yet, but they need to hear the message or story you have. Writers don't send their manuscript to an agent before it's ready. Consider platform as part of that process of being ready. Don't pitch your story until you have a baseline to work with. A baseline is better than nothing. And if you only have 3 followers on Twitter, please just leave that out. Give an agent your best work. At the very least, make sure you show up when he or she googles your name. This is just scraping the surface when it comes to the things I see happen in the slush pile. If you take at least one of the things I said to heart, then it means you're already one step closer to being that one in ten. Stay tuned for more Slush Pile Stories in the future! If you have any questions about the slush pile, I'd be happy to answer them in the comments or dedicate another blog post to them. |
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May 2019
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