Why Does Your First Chapter Suck?

When all else fails, add pixie dust.

 

The first chapter is the door to the rest of the book. The first chapter is a fist of firsts: first sentence, first hook, first introduction to the cast of characters, first goal, first twist, first turn, and first cliffhanger.



Newbie writers know this, and try to stuff everything into the first chapter.



And it sucks big time.



So what went wrong?



The newbie scratches her head, and re-reads one or two famous books in her genre and discovers …...