If I can’t latch onto some danger, mystery, or conflict, I don’t want to keep reading. You should create conflict on the first page. Your readers are smart, and when you make them feel dumb because they can’t remember who Tommy Garanger is, and why he has a bedsheet on his head, they won’t want to keep reading. I read a lot of novel drafts that introduce eight or more characters in the first chapter, and that’s just confusing. So do your reader a favor and stick with a few important characters in the first chapter. Nobody likes meeting 20 people at the same time, in real life or in fiction. You can be coy in the bedroom, but not in the beginning of your novel. Don’t try to be coy in your novel openings. I want the main character right away, and I want to know what’s troubling them. It’s annoying to read 5 pages and discover that the character I was investing in turns out to be irrelevant. The writer is settling into the story, giving information and backstory, rather than starting the actual story! Find the real beginning of your story - it’s where the character encounters a problem or conflict - and make sure that it is your first paragraph (or at least your first page). This is the most common mistake I see in books I edit. In that post, I talk about characters, plot, point of view, theme, conflict, and climaxes - everything a writer needs to finish their novel.īut if you want more than luck, read these tips for how to start a novel and avoid some frequent pitfalls! 1. Good luck to all of you.Īnd if you’re less of a negative Nancy and more of a sunny-side up person, read my post on the positive ways you should start a novel.ġ2 Steps to Writing a Bestseller in 6 Months This list was made in honor of NaNoWriMo, which started yesterday, and I post it as a tribute to all those souls trying to knock out 50,000 words in a mere 30 days. Well, avoid these 25 mistakes and you’ll be well on your way. And she had destroyed herself, crushed by an insult that had appalled and amazed that childish soul, had smirched that angel purity with unmerited disgrace and torn from her a last scream of despair, unheeded and brutally disregarded, on a dark night in the cold and wet while the wind howled 25 Terrible Ways to Start a Novel ‹ Back to blog She was only fourteen, but her heart was broken. Svidrigaïlov knew that girl there was no holy image, no burning candle beside the coffin no sound of prayers: the girl had drowned herself. The stern and already rigid profile of her face looked as though chiselled of marble too, and the smile on her pale lips was full of an immense unchildish misery and sorrowful appeal. But her loose fair hair was wet there was a wreath of roses on her head. Among the flowers lay a girl in a white muslin dress, with her arms crossed and pressed on her bosom, as though carved out of marble. The coffin was covered with white silk and edged with a thick white frill wreaths of flowers surrounded it on all sides. The birds were chirruping under the window, and in the middle of the room, on a table covered with a white satin shroud, stood a coffin. The floors were strewn with freshly-cut fragrant hay, the windows were open, a fresh, cool, light air came into the room. He was reluctant to move away from them, but he went up the stairs and came into a large, high drawing-room and again everywhere-at the windows, the doors on to the balcony, and on the balcony itself-were flowers. He noticed particularly in the windows nosegays of tender, white, heavily fragrant narcissus bending over their bright, green, thick long stalks. A light, cool staircase, carpeted with rich rugs, was decorated with rare plants in china pots. A fine, sumptuous country cottage in the English taste overgrown with fragrant flowers, with flower beds going round the house the porch, wreathed in climbers, was surrounded with beds of roses. He kept dwelling on images of flowers, he fancied a charming flower garden, a bright, warm, almost hot day, a holiday-Trinity day. Perhaps the cold, or the dampness, or the dark, or the wind that howled under the window and tossed the trees roused a sort of persistent craving for the fantastic. But one image rose after another, incoherent scraps of thought without beginning or end passed through his mind. He was not thinking of anything and did not want to think. There was a cold damp draught from the window, however without getting up he drew the blanket over him and wrapped himself in it. “It’s better not to sleep at all,” he decided. He got up and sat on the edge of the bedstead with his back to the window.
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