Now that you’ve finished your outline, you’re ready to start writing. If you ran out of ideas before you finished, don’t worry, as you begin to do the actual writing, you’ll start getting more ideas that you can add to the plot.

That all important first page

The first page of your book will get you off to an awesome start or it will kill your novel deader (is that a word?) than last year’s roses.

Most writers think that the first page is what gets your novel going. But that’s wrong. Your book needs to start with a bang. It needs to capture your reader’s attention and it needs to set the tone for your book. If you’re writing a romance, and your first page starts with a murder, you may need to rethink that first page. Okay, I can think of ways to make this work, but I can also see you looking your romance readers rather quickly. A first page that starts with a murder could be a good starting place for a murder mystery or a thriller.

Ellen Brock in her Novel Book Camp compares the first page of your book to a movie audition. If the director likes your audition, then he’ll give you a call back. This is a chance to show more of what you can do.

Your first page is your audition. If the reader likes your audition, then they’ll keep reading giving you a call back. If your novel doesn’t deliver what your first page promises, then the reader will be disappointed. If the reader is disappointed, they’ll close the book and put it back on the shelf. If an agent or an editor likes your first page, he or she could request either additional pages or the full novel. This request can be compared to a movie callback. This is what you want your first page to do—it needs to sell your novel to an agent, an editor and finally the reader.

Does your first page set the right tone for you novel?

Ms. Brock says that amateur writers set the wrong tone for three reasons.

1.      The writer doesn’t know what the tone of the novel is when they first start writing. When they finish the first draft, they don’t go back and correct the beginning. This is a real problem for amateur writers who are pantsers. They don’t know where their novel is going so it is difficult for them to know what tone to set.

2.      The writer thinks that the logical place to start their novel is boring so they makeup what they think is a better beginning and it doesn’t match the book they’ve envisioned.

3.      The writer is too busy cramming information on to the first page to write an on-tone first chapter.

To set the tone of your novel, decide what the novel is going to be about. Is it a horror novel, science fiction, romance? Once you know this, you can find ways to integrate this into your first page and first chapter. If you are a pantser, you can write the scenes that are in your head. I know of one writer who wrote her book backwards. She wrote the final chapter because that was all she could see, then she wrote the next to the last chapter and so on. I don’t know if that would work for anyone else, but it’s something to try.

Since you want your novel to build in intensity, you don’t want make your first page the most intense part of your novel, but you do want it to be gripping and attention getting.

So follow Ellen’s steps as you write (and rewrite and rewrite and probably rewrite) your first page. And remember, writing is work. You wouldn’t expect to do successful brain surgery without schooling and practice. It isn’t fair to expect to sell your novel without schooling and practice.

1.      Identify the tone of your novel.

2.      Identify the external and internal conflict.

3.      Consider whether your first page reflects the overall tone of the novel.

4.      Does your opening mirror the conflict, either internal or external in your novel?

5.      Write a new opening or make notes on what changes you need to make.

Have a great week and enjoy your writing.

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