How to Analyze Your Novel’s First Page
And why you should.
This probably isn’t news to you, but I’m going to say it anyway. The first page of your novel matters. A lot. It matters more than any other page in your entire book.
It’s the page the rest of your novel is judged by.
If an agent or editor isn’t captured by those 250 or so words, then they’re not going to turn the page. Even if they requested that you send them the damn thing.
If a reader isn’t, then they’re not going to buy the book. In fact, in that first page, you’re entering into a contract with that reader. So, if you do capture them and they buy the book and keep reading, but the story turns out to not be what was promised in that first page — you’ll lose them.
Which means that your first page actually affects your other books, too.
See? Important. So, let’s talk today about how to analyze that first page to make sure that you’ve got it right. Not grammatically. Not technically. That first page needs to be elementally right.
This is a two-step process.
Step One: Ask yourself some questions.
Read your first page. Literally just what’s on that very first page in your manuscript. If you’re not sure where your first…
