Quote:
Originally Posted by gmw
I would say that while the opening pages of the book should try to gain the readers attention, it is probably more important that you don't put-off or offend your reader (with your writing, is some genres offense in the content may be part of grabbing the reader's attention).
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I can't speak for others, but in my case you get about two paragraphs to make me want to read the rest of the book; if I don't want to read the third, then I'll move on. Getting those two paragraphs right is something I need to work on more in my own writing.
I remember reading a comment from an agent on the web a couple of years ago, which was something along the lines of 'there are few things wrong with most first novels that you can't fix by cutting the first three chapters'. Most new writers put far too much back story in their novel before the real story gets going. I suspect this is an example, and I would have read further into the book if it started with Betty's version up above.