Writing techniques

how to write

Joan Wickersham

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There is an interview called “Inside the Writing Life” in my high school alumni magazine.  A prominent English instructor is interviewing Joan Wickersham who graduated nearly two decades after me.  Ms Wickersham has been writing most of the time since graduation; her work includes her memoir and 2008 National Book Award finalist, The Suicide Index; a book of short fiction, The News from Spain; and The Paper Anniversary, a novel.  She writes a regular op-ed column for The  Boston Globe; her writing has been published in prominent literary journals; and she has read her work on National Public Radio.

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Joan Wickersham

Two questions and answers in this interview caught my eye.

Q: (David Weber) “You’ve sustained your output over many years.  Does the problem of writer’s block seem remote to you, or have you struggled at times to give your work the priority required?”

Wickersham: “There’s a very funny little moment in a movie I once saw, where a bored, impatient woman is trying to figure out where a piece fits in a jigsaw puzzle and she finally just puts in somewhere and smacks it in with her fist.  Writer’s block is a sign that what I’m doing isn’t working, and I can’t fix it by trying to ram something into a place where it doesn’t belong. It can take months to figure out that what I thought was a piece of the sky is actually a piece of the ocean, or that its a part of a different puzzle altogether.  I hate writer’s block, but I’m always grateful to it in hindsight.  It usually means that what I’ve been writing is somehow false, which is just as bad in fiction as nonfiction.  Writer’s block slows me down and makes me throw out pages and drafts – after I’d been working on the book about my father’s suicide for nine years, I threw out a 400 page manuscript and started over – but getting stuck can be an important investment in finding the right way to tell a story.”

I like this way of thinking about writer’s block: it’s not you that are the problem; it’s the story.  Sometimes, when I sit down to write, I feel cornered.  I’ll look back over what  I’ve written, and ask myself ‘what’s not working?’  Other times, particularly when I’m lying awake at night, I’ll start feeling uneasy about the direction of a particular novel.  That feeling generally leads to surgery.  When I was writing Sable Shadow & The Presence, I threw out and re-wrote whole chapters of the book, which has gone on to win eight awards.

Q: “Does a fully realized piece require its own new form, not just descriptive skill and the authority of honesty?”

Wickersham: “A lot of what I’m doing when I write is trying to figure out the inherent rules of a particular piece – the form or structure which will be most true to the story.  My husband, Jay, is trained as an architect.  A long time ago, when I was struggling to write about my father’s suicide, he told me that the students at the École des Beaux-Arts begin each design with a parti – an organizing principle.  I found this idea of the parti exciting and liberating.  I’d been wresting for years with how to organize the messy and painful story of my father’s death, and part of the problem was that the story defied any attempt at a conventional linear narrative.  When I stumbled in the parti of organizing the book as an index, suddenly I had this cool, numb structure that simultaneously imposed order and ridiculed the idea of imposing order on an inherently chaotic experience”.

I never heard of the term parti before, but it makes sense.  The novel I’m currently working on has an unusual organizing principle: two increasingly hostile narrators, whose identity is obscure at first, tell alternating chapters about three, very different, young protagonists over whom they have influence, but no control.  The setting is present day East Africa.

Review: Selection Day

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My wife bought me a copy of this novel – signed by the author!  – while I was briefly in the hospital (nothing very serious) and I wanted something to read.  Hospitals are a great place to read: one is always waiting for the next procedure to take place; one can make oneself comfortable; and it is not particularly noisy!  She bought it because I had asked for a novel by a Man Booker shortlist author.  The author, Aravind Adiga, actually won the Man Booker in 2008 for his first novel, The White Tiger.  Adiga was born in Madras (new Chennai) India in 1974; after achieving his secondary school certificate, he emigrated with his family to Australia, where he graduated from high school in Sydney.  He graduated, next, from Columbia University in 1997 and subsequently studied English literature at Magdelan College, Oxford.  He began his business career as a financial journalist with the Financial Times, Money and Time before becoming freelance.

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Aravind Adiga

Selection Day is a book focused on Indian cricket and its effect on a Mumbai slum family of two boys and their compulsive father.  Radha, the older brother, expects to fulfill his father’s dream of being selected for a top Indian team.  Tommy Sir, a coach/agent/promoter introduces the boys father, Mohan, to a ‘businessman’, Anand Mehta, who pays Mohan a stipend in return for a large slice of the boy’s earnings when they become famous.  Unexpectedly, Manju, the younger boy, is the better batsman, scoring 497 not out in a crucial contest.  Radha has a ‘weight transfer problem’ which is inhibiting his effectiveness as a batsman.  Enter a rival, Javed, a cocky, rebellious, rich kid who is also a fine batsman, and who happens to be gay.  Manju, at the center of the story, is his older brother’s best friend and rival, and his father’s severest but respectful critic.  The younger batsman is torn between his admiration for Javed, and his reluctance to commit to an intimate relationship; and between careers in cricketing or in science.

Selection Day offers a rich mixture of conflicted, imperfect characters with whom the reader cannot help but empathize.  The setting of Mumbai is drawn with natural clarity; one feels truly present.  And without being a ‘book about cricket’, Selection Day, presents the culture, the mystique, the competitiveness of Indian youth critic captivatingly, without technical fussiness.  The dialogue is credible, but occasionally seems too tangential to lead the reader to any firm conclusions.  Perhaps, this is Mr Adiga’s intention with this novel: to make the point that, try as one might, there can never be the achievement of one’s ultimate dream.

This sense of failure seems to carry over into the two concluding parts of the novel: what happens after selection day and in the epilogue.  One cannot help but be engaged by the beautiful writing, the energy, and the unfolding future in the lead up to selection day.  The writing is as good, but the energy and the future have dissipated after selection day.  Perhaps this novel could feel more whole, more consistent, if dreams could be scaled back rather than dispelled, and the energy and the future modestly re-directed.

Review: The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins

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I bought this book – an historic novel – in a Waterstones bookstore because I had nothing to read at that moment and it looked interesting.  Its author is Antonia Hodgson who grew up in Derby and studied English at the University of Leeds.  Her first novel, The Devil in Marshalsea, won the 2014 Historical Dagger Award.  Ms Hodgson lives in London, where she is an editor.

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Antonia Hodgson

The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins is set in a rather down-market section of Georgian London.  Its principal character, Thomas Hawkins is a ‘gentleman’ who killed a man in self-defense in prison, and throughout the story is under threat of being hung for murder.  There are several intertwining plots.  One involves a rather loathsome neighbour who is a member of the Society for the Reformation of Manners (a pathological moralist) and whose own morals permit him to consort with prostitutes and to beat his children.  The neighbour is suddenly dead.  Who killed him?  Thomas, one of the children, the apprentice, the son of a notorious gang?  Another plot involves King George’ mistress who is also a lady in waiting to Queen Charlotte.  This Henrietta Howard (who was a real person) is a pawn in the struggle of her very evil, estranged husband to extort money from the king.  The queen, also a real person, is caught in the middle and manages to capture Thomas as her rook to defeat the black knight, Charles Howard.  To keep things going, there is Kitty, the pretty and libidinous girlfriend of Thomas.

There is plenty of action in this rather engaging tale which moves along at a frenetic pace with many twists and turns along the way.  The characters are well-developed and likable or despicable; the dialogue is terse and credible.  The Covent Garden area of London is well described in physical and moral terms, but it was difficult to picture oneself in the setting.  It is not just a familiarity with the Covent Garden of today that blocked – to some extent – the credibility of the scene; it was more that at a feeling level one is somewhat remote. Having said this, one has to admire the depth of Ms Hodgson’s research into the times, the issues and the characters.  There are plenty of surprises in The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins – they certainly keep the reader engaged – but sometimes the events seemed a little too contrived.  For example, the events around the ambush of Henrietta’s carriage by her husband, and the conclusion where Thomas is sent on a new mission by the queen.  The cockfight and the duel of the female gladiators, while authentic and interesting, added little to the story line.

For those who like a historical novel with an anchor in truth, one with many fascinating twists and turns, with important, stand-out characters, and a good helping of mystery, The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins is the novel for you!

Characterization

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My wife and I went to see the Picasso exhibition of portraits at the National Portrait Gallery last Saturday.  Until I went to the exhibition, I hadn’t been aware of the enormous range of portraits, in varying styles, Picasso had painted, and most were not included in the exhibition.  I have to confess that I liked best Picasso’s paintings in the traditional style.  In these paintings, one can really see Picasso’s artistic skill.

One other aspect of these paintings that impressed me was that the character of the subject was clearly identified in the picture.  It was this aspect that reminded me of the writer’s task in establishing an identity in his characters.  Picasso was less interested in presenting a clear likeness of his subject than in suggesting to the viewer the personality of the subject.

Let me illustrate:

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Olga Khokhlova

These are two portraits of Olga Khokhlova, Picasso’s first wife and a Ukrainian ballerina whom Picasso married in 1918.  The painting on the right was done early in the relationship.  In it one can see an elegant, beautifully dressed woman whom Picasso admired greatly.  Olga was, in fact an aristocrat who enjoyed a full social life.  Picasso grew tired of the meaningless social life and returned to his private, bohemian lifestyle, eventually beginning an affair with the 17 year-old Parisian girl, Marie-Thérèse Walter.  The two stayed married until Olga’s death in 1955 because Picasso refused to grant a divorce which would have given her half his assets.  The portrait on the left is of Olga painted during the period of estrangement.  Her head appears to be precariously attached to her body signifying, perhaps, lack of substance.  Her hair is orderly and disorderly.  The stylish purple hat looks rather silly.  The black eyes look out toward Picasso critically.  The mouth is small and a bit sad.  In these two portraits one can see both a changed relationship and two different views of the same person.

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Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler

Kahnweiler was a German-born art historian, art collector, and one of the premier French art dealers of the 20th century. He became prominent as an art gallery owner in Paris beginning in 1907 and he was among the first champions of cubism and Picasso.  Picasso wrote of Kahnweiler “What would have become of us if Kahnweiler hadn’t had a business sense?”  The figure in the painting is imposing, the head powerful, the hands relaxed but commanding.  There is light that seems to emanate from the head and the hands.  One has the impression of a dynamic, creative and important person.  When one looks at the painting itself, which must be about a meter and a half tall, one can’t help but be impressed by the intricacy of the brushwork and the hours that Picasso worked on this portrait.  It is certainly a fitting tribute to a very important influence in Picasso’s life.

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Jacqueline Roque

Jacqueline Roque was Picasso’s second wife whom he married in 1961, and she outlived him.  She was his favorite female subject; in 1963 he painted her portrait 160 times, and continued to paint her, in increasingly abstracted forms, until 1972.  In looking at the portrait, one has a sense of a strong relationship between the subject and the painter.  She is dressed in black but does not seem to be in mourning; in fact her forthright stare and raised eyebrows suggest a positive outlook.  She appears to be about to disclose something important.  The figure expresses confidence and femininity.

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Old Man

This is a self-portrait of Picasso in a posture similar to a Rembrandt self-portrait; Picasso greatly admired Rembrandt.  This was painted in the last year of Picasso’s life, and suggests a powerful figure looking out on the world.  There is little motion in the picture, except for what appears to be heat on the right which dissipates toward the left.  His right hand is clearly shown; the left hand is somehow disabled.  His exposed upper torso conveys a sense of vitality in spite if the stasis.  The face seems prepared to make an announcement.  Overall, one has the impression of a painter who knows what he wants to paint and why and who cares very little for the reaction of his audience.

Picasso was highly skilled in communicating a message along with the image in his paintings, and this is particularly evident in his portraits.  Artists and writers share a challenge: defining a character to the viewer/reader.

New Novel

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My latest novel, Seeking Father Khaliq, has just been published.

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Seeking Father Khaliq is a modern allegory about one man’s search for spiritual fulfillment. Set in the Middle East, philosophy professor Kareem al-Busiri teaches at a prestigious Egyptian university.
The professor is persuaded by a Princess Basheera to find Father Khaliq for her.  From time-to-time, the professor wonders whether the princess is real or did he imagine her?  In the search, he undertakes important pilgrimages: the Hajj, Arba’een (the huge Shia pilgrimage to Karbala in Iraq), to Medina (the Prophet’s tomb), to Jerusalem and Rome. He falls in love with a colleague who was his late wife’s best friend, and who like his late wife and daughter is a Coptic Christian.  He attempts to manage mortal conflicts of values and ideology between his two sons.  One son is an Egyptian army officer; the other is a lawyer who is secretly providing money and arms to the terrorist insurgency in the Sinai.  Classical Arabic philosophy is woven into the narrative to support certain viewpoints.

The back cover continues:
Carefully researched and constructed, this dynamic story reflects the current religious, political, and social turmoil of the region.
Seeking Father Khaliq is unique in its Middle East setting, and its focus on Islam, as well as elements of Christianity and Judaism. The use of the jihadist conflict in Egypt as a surrogate for larger regional conflicts, the religious pilgrimages, and the resolution of inter-faith marriage issues are also highlighted.

There are two reviews, so far:

E. Lund for Phi Beta Kappa Reviews said, in part:

” . . . Author William Peace has woven a compelling narrative that explores the issues of religion, politics and social change, all while avoiding the pitfalls of becoming a treatise. Instead, “Seeking Father Khaliq” is a moving study of a family caught up in the volatile turmoil of the times, and a father who finds that moving closer to God is a way to navigate forward.  Beautifully written with vivid depictions of religious pilgrimages, the book also delivers three dimensional characters fully realized and equally empathetic. Highly recommended for those who want to know more about this important part of the world, but as much to be enjoyed simply on its narrative merits. “

Deborah Lloyd for Reader’s Favorite said, in part:

“. . . The author’s writing style is clear and concise. The account is thought-provoking and fascinating; the reader will be forever changed. This is a much-needed book during these difficult, challenging times in our modern world.”

I will just add that this book was a great pleasure to write.  I spent at least as much time on the internet researching as I did in the actual writing.  It took two years to write – about half my normal pace.  I also feel that my original idea for the book blossomed very nicely: one man’s search for God, Middle East setting, key character a philosophy professor, told in the first person, two sons on opposite sides of the regional divide.

I hope you enjoy it!

Composition: Music and Prose

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Last night, I heard, for the first time, evidence of the shared skills of composers and authors.  My wife and I went to a Royal Philharmonic Orchestra concert which featured Wagner’s Tannháuser Overture, Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 2, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 4.  Pierre Vallet was the conductor and Elizabeth Sombart was the pianist.  For me the music got better as the evening progressed.  I should explain that I am no music critic; I never played an instrument, and I can’t really read music, although I sang first tenor and then baritone in two different small singing groups in high school and college.

The Wagner piece was enjoyable, but it didn’t really engage me.  I kept thinking of Nietzsche’s criticism of Wagner: that he became an insufferable egotist.  Elizabeth Sombart’s recital of Chopin was very impressive.   I sat there and thought: ‘How wonderful it must be to be able to play like that!’  And Chopin’s music was lovely.  But it was Beethoven’s Fourth that really caught my attention.  I’ve heard it played at least a dozen times before, but, until last night, never by a live orchestra.

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Composer of the Fourth Symphony

The music was captivating, and I watched the musicians play with what seemed like gusto.  I began to think about the composition of the music to which I was listening  This was a very clever composer: he keeps his audience fully engaged.  And I began to identify aspects of the music that I felt bore similarities to the composition of good prose.

  • The piece has a unity to it.  It was clearly the work of one composer: it was telling one musical story in four movements.  Each movement shared musical themes and techniques with the others, but one felt a progression in the movements.  At times, I have felt that a particular piece of classical music could have been serially composed by two or more people.
  • There was plenty of emotion.  Sometimes a flute and first violins would pick out a sweet and gentle theme.  At other times the timpani, brass and eight basses would thunder out in rage.  There was love, there was anger, there was joy and wonder.
  • There was plenty of suspense.  The first movement begins with a dark, gloomy section: What is this about?  But gradually it gives way to a bright, cheerful theme: Will this continue?  Whenever a new theme was introduced, it would begin to tease, and one would wonder what is coming?  The techniques for generating suspense varied: Pianissimo building to Forte, or the other way ’round, or themes evolving in variations; or sudden shifts in the instruments; or instruments playing ascending scales.
  • There was a lot of conversation.  For, example the violins would start a theme which would be picked up and changed by the cellos; the violins would respond with the changed theme and change it further.
  • There were changes in pace.  Sometimes the music was slowly deliberate: in no hurry; at other times, it was in a sensational rush, particularly in the fourth movement.

With this insight, perhaps I will enjoy classical music more than I have in the past.  And I have always enjoyed going to concerts.

J K Rowling’s Writing Tips

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Recently, I accompanied my grandchildren on a trip to the Harry Potter exhibition at Warner Brothers Studios near Watford.  I have to confess that I am not a Harry Potter fan, but I certainly enjoyed the outing to the exhibition.  I found it astonishing the detail that goes into creating the real visual effects that appear on the screen.

Certainly J K Rowling is a brilliant author to have created the seven Harry Potter books which are so popular, worldwide.  Yesterday, I ran across her top five writing tips on the Now Novel blog.  I thought I would republish and comment on them.

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J K Rowling

1.    Write in whatever time you have

One of J.K. Rowling’s most famous quotes is: “Sometimes you have to get your writing done in spare moments here and there.” This is crucial advice on writing a book. It’s easy for us to imagine successful writers spending all day penning beautiful paragraphs, but everybody had to start somewhere. For Rowling, that somewhere included full-time work and finding stolen pockets of time to write. Much as it might be a dream to take six months out to write your book, odds are you’re going to have to fit it into your everyday life.

I agree that it is unwise – even couterproductive – to establish an overall deadline (unless you publisher insists on it).  For me, the minimum size of a ‘stolen pocket’ is an hour.  In less than an hour, I can’t get into a fully creative mode.

2.    Planning is essential

Instead of diving right into line 1, J.K. Rowling advises taking the time to plan out the world your books will live in. She took five years to create and develop every last detail of the Harry Potter world. Every part of Rowling’s books was planned and worked out, right down to how the Wizards and Muggles interacted (and the word Muggles, to begin with!) what the education was like, how magic helped in every day life and how the wizarding world of government worked. She also plotted out all the events of the seven books before she started writing the first.

Great if you can do it!  I write a two page outline of a novel before I start it, but for me, this is just a framework.  I find that characters want to behave differently and therefor events change, or I get an ‘inspiration’ that causes me to deviate from the original plan.  I depend a lot on these inspirations!

3.    Rewriting is just as essential

You would think after five years, J.K. Rowling would just be able to dive right in and write the whole of the first Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, without much rewriting. She rewrote the opening chapter of her first book a total of fifteen times, however. It’s easy to imagine published authors writing with the greatest of ease, but actually the process is just as difficult for them.

I agree!  I don’t think I’ve ever reached fifteen re-writes, but four of five is not uncommon.  For me, the scope of a rewrite tends to decrease over time: after a major rewrite, what follows tends to be less and less radical.

4.    Be aware of plot and pacing

Even when you’ve plotted out all seven of the books you want to write in a series, you can trip yourself up. In fact, that’s one of the big things to be aware of when you’ve done the necessary planning: even though you know what’s going to happen next, your readers shouldn’t. They need to have a sense of excitement and uncertainty as the plot and pacing unfolds because this is where magic lies. After J.K. Rowling finished the first book in the Harry Potter series, she realised she’d given away the whole plot of the series. So she had to rewrite it, and hold back a number of integral plot points.

I tend to make changes to the plot once I’ve started writing a novel.  These changes make the novel more interesting, more exciting, or better convey the overall message of the work.  But I agree that one has to be careful that the revised plot flows seamlessly with no inconsistencies.

5.    Write your passion

Perhaps a favourite J.K. Rowling quote is: “What you write becomes who you are… So make sure you love what you write!” One of the reasons the Harry Potter books are so infectious is because you can tell she really loves the world she created – and all the characters in them. If you’re going to approach your book in a half-hearted manner, there’s no point even beginning it. Make sure you’re passionate about what you write and you’ll draw your readers along with you.

This is very true!  Occasionally, I find that the work is starting to lose interest for me.  Then I know that something is wrong and significant changes are required.  For example, I gave a literary friend a draft of Sable Shadow & The Presence before it was finished.  His comment: “It’s boring.”  I agreed, and I put it aside while I wrote Hidden Battlefields.  When I came back to the manuscript it was with new ideas and new enthusiasm.  When I finished, my friend (like many others) gave it a very good review.

Review: Whiskey Tango Foxtrot

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My wife and I saw this film last weekend.  It was a disappointment.  The film, which is military code for ‘what the f**k’, is based on the memoir, The Taliban Shuffle, written by Kim Barker, about her assignments as a war correspondent in Pakistan and Afghanistan.  I haven’t read the book; I read an article about Ms Barker and the book that appeared in The Telegraph.  The book sounded interesting and thoughtful, with a black sense of humour.  In fact, the New York Times book review confirmed this.

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Kim Barker

The film, which has Tina Fey playing Ms Barker, begins with her volunteering for an assignment in Afghanistan to escape her humdrum assignment of covering minor stories; besides: she is single with no children.  She is thrown into cheap accommodation in the green zone with a lot of other expatriates, some of whom are competing for the same stories.  A US Marine general regards her as an inexperienced liability, but she achieves credibility by gaining candid interviews with US soldiers, putting herself in harms way to capture video footage, and by gaining the respect of some Afghans.  Eventually, she realises that being a war correspondent is not in her best long term interest, and she returns to the States.

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                                                                                                                                   Tina Fey

I had three problems with WTF.  First of all there was too much emphasis on the partying going on among the correspondents and other expats.  The film left me with the impression that every night was an Animal House blow-out.  While I’m sure there was uninhibited drinking and casual sex, the emphasis on that aspect of life as a war correspondent made it difficult to position the film as a serious commentary, which Ms Barker’s book clearly is.

Secondly, the dialogue was difficult to follow.  Actors were speaking at a frantic pace and using lots of slang.  Eventually, I realised I could understand what was going on by just watching the video.  If the audience can’t follow the dialogue, why include it?

Third, and most important, the film was a series of events, some funny, some sad, some thought provoking, some totally forgettable, without a unifying theme or message, except that the danger involved in covering a war can be addicting.  Ms Barker, in her book draws several sobering conclusions about the ‘Af-Pak’ region, and why the West was doomed to fail in its strategy of involvement.

I will say that Tina Fey is engaging in the lead role, Christopher Abbott is credible as her Afghan fixer, and Martin Freeman does a fine job as the lustful, flippant Scottish correspondent.  Some of the video footage is worth seeing, and there are some examples which illustrate the huge culture gap, but these opportunities are largely lost.

Review: The Past

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I bought Tessa Hadley’s latest novel, The Past, because of a very favourable review in Time Magazine.  Ms Hadley is the author of five previous novels which have achieved recognition.  She has also produced two short story collections, and her writing appears regularly in The New Yorker.

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Tessa Hadley

The Past is about the journey of three sisters and a brother, all adult, to their grandparents’ run-down, abandoned, old home in the Somerset countryside.  They meet there for three weeks of holiday in the summer to decide what to do with the house, now that their parents are dead.  The house is filled with memories; their mother took them there as children when she left her husband.  Conflicts, jealousies and attachments emerge during the three weeks.  Fran’s two young children, Ivy and Arthur; Molly, Roland’s sixteen-year-old daughter; his third wife, Pilar; and Kasim, the twenty-year-old son of Alice’s ex-boyfriend, add interest and complexity.

Ms Hadley’s writing is beautiful.  The descriptions of the Somerset country are almost poetic: her fondness for rural England is unmistakable.  The characters are real and well-drawn, with the possible exceptions of Kasim, who often seems petulantly distant for a man of college age, and Ivy, whose behaviour seems unaccountably contrarian.

The only problem I had with The Past is that nothing of real significance happens.  There is plenty of interaction among the characters which sheds light on their personalities and values.  Personal histories emerge.  The most significant events are the children finding a dead dog, Kasim and Molly making love, Harriet making a pass at Pilar, and one of the sisters estranged husbands’ being sent away.  The inside of the dust jacket says, “small disturbances build into familial crises”, but the crises are neither grand, nor ultimately meaningful.

However, if one is seeking a comfortable, quintessential British story about family, The Past would be a very good choice.

What Literary Agents Dislike

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Chuck Sambuchino contributed an interesting  post to the Writer UnBoxed blog, excerpts of which appear below.  Chuck is a freelance editor of query letters, synopses, book proposals, and manuscripts. As an editor for Writer’s Digest Books, he edits the Guide to Literary Agents.

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Chuck Sambuchino

“No one reads more prospective novel beginnings than literary agents. They’re the ones on the front lines — sifting through inboxes and slush piles. And they’re the ones who can tell us which Chapter 1 approaches are overused and cliche, as well as which techniques just plain don’t work. Below find a smattering of feedback from experienced literary agents on what they hate to see the first pages of a writer’s submission. Avoid these problems and tighten your submission!

FALSE BEGINNINGS

“I don’t like it when the main character dies at the end of Chapter 1. Why did I just spend all this time with this character? I feel cheated.”
– Cricket Freeman, The August Agency

“I dislike opening scenes that you think are real, then the protagonist wakes up. It makes me feel cheated.”
– Laurie McLean, Foreword Literary

PROLOGUES

“I’m not a fan of prologues, preferring to find myself in the midst of a moving plot on page 1 rather than being kept outside of it, or eased into it.”
– Michelle Andelman, Regal Agency

“Most agents hate prologues. Just make the first chapter relevant and well written.”
– Andrea Brown, Andrea Brown Literary Agency

“Prologues are usually a lazy way to give back-story chunks to the reader and can be handled with more finesse throughout the story. Damn the prologue, full speed ahead!”
– Laurie McLean, Foreword Literary

EXPOSITION/DESCRIPTION

“Perhaps my biggest pet peeve with an opening chapter is when an author features too much exposition – when they go beyond what is necessary for simply ‘setting the scene.’ I want to feel as if I’m in the hands of a master storyteller, and starting a story with long, flowery, overly-descriptive sentences (kind of like this one) makes the writer seem amateurish and the story contrived. Of course, an equally jarring beginning can be nearly as off-putting, and I hesitate to read on if I’m feeling disoriented by the fifth page. I enjoy when writers can find a good balance between exposition and mystery. Too much accounting always ruins the mystery of a novel, and the unknown is what propels us to read further.”
– Peter Miller, PMA Literary and Film Management

“I dislike endless ‘laundry list’ character descriptions. For example: ‘She had eyes the color of a summer sky and long blonde hair that fell in ringlets past her shoulders. Her petite nose was the perfect size for her heart-shaped face. Her azure dress—with the empire waist and long, tight sleeves—sported tiny pearl buttons down the bodice. Ivory lace peeked out of the hem in front, blah, blah.’ Who cares! Work it into the story.”
– Laurie McLean, Foreword Literary

STARTING TOO SLOW

“Characters that are moving around doing little things, but essentially nothing. Washing dishes & thinking, staring out the window & thinking, tying shoes, thinking.”
– Dan Lazaar, Writers House

“I don’t really like ‘first day of school’ beginnings, ‘from the beginning of time,’ or ‘once upon a time.’ Specifically, I dislike a Chapter 1 in which nothing happens.”
– Jessica Regel, Jean V. Naggar Literary Agency

VOICE

“I know this may sound obvious, but too much ‘telling’ vs. ‘showing’ in the first chapter is a definite warning sign for me. The first chapter should present a compelling scene, not a road map for the rest of the book. The goal is to make the reader curious about your characters, fill their heads with questions that must be answered, not fill them in on exactly where, when, who and how.”
– Emily Sylvan Kim, Prospect Agency

“I hate reading purple prose – describing something so beautifully that has nothing to do with the actual story.”
– Cherry Weiner, Cherry Weiner Literary

“A cheesy hook drives me nuts. They say ‘Open with a hook!’ to grab the reader. That’s true, but there’s a fine line between an intriguing hook and one that’s just silly. An example of a silly hook would be opening with a line of overtly sexual dialogue.”
– Daniel Lazaar, Writers House

“I don’t like an opening line that’s ‘My name is…,’ introducing the narrator to the reader so blatantly. There are far better ways in Chapter 1 to establish an instant connection between narrator and reader.”
– Michelle Andelman, Regal Literary

“Sometimes a reasonably good writer will create an interesting character and describe him in a compelling way, but then he’ll turn out to be some unimportant bit player.”
– Ellen Pepus, Signature Literary Agency

CHARACTERS AND BACKSTORY

“I don’t like descriptions of the characters where writers make them too perfect. Heroines (and heroes) who are described physically as being virtually unflawed come across as unrelatable and boring. No ‘flowing, wind-swept golden locks’; no ‘eyes as blue as the sky’; no ‘willowy, perfect figures.’ ”
– Laura Bradford, Bradford Literary Agency

“Many writers express the character’s backstory before they get to the plot. Good writers will go back and cut that stuff out and get right to the plot. The character’s backstory stays with them—it’s in their DNA.”
– Adam Chromy, Movable Type Management

“I’m turned off when a writer feels the need to fill in all the backstory before starting the story; a story that opens on the protagonist’s mental reflection of their situation is a red flag.”
– Stephany Evans, FinePrint Literary Management

“One of the biggest problems is the ‘information dump’ in the first few pages, where the author is trying to tell us everything we supposedly need to know to understand the story. Getting to know characters in a story is like getting to know people in real life. You find out their personality and details of their life over time.”
– Rachelle Gardner, Books & Such Literary

I agree with all of these points except ‘Prologue’ (in some cases).  I have a prologue in two of my novels.  The first novel has a prologue and an epilogue, set in a later time frame, to help the reader understand that the narrator is an adult who was a child in the story.  If I had it to do over again, I would do it differently.

Sable Shadow & The Presence has a prologue and an epilogue.  In this case, the prologue has no back story; rather, it jumps ahead and establishes a central theme of the novel.  The epilogue tells the reader what happened after that.  So, I think there situations where a prologue can be useful.