Prologues, opinions/thoughts.

[Rainy]

Ok, I've seen some people say they don't think prologues are necessary/they don't like them. I personally include a prologue in my book because it takes place so many years before the main story, that it didn't fit in as a chapter. But I've also seen small publishers say they won't take a story if it has a prologue. This stumped me, or just caught my mind because they have their place in a story, the idea of a prologue exists for a reason yet they also seem kind of hated by people.

Any thoughts or opinions to add are welcome!

[Andreas]

Writers love prologues, readers hate them. And here's why.

Writers know their story inside and out, readers don't know anything. So in a writer's mind a backstory or something like that makes perfectly sense. For a new reader who knows nothing about the characters and the setting, it is absolutely pointless. You read it and by the time the real story begins everything is already forgotten. And there's another thing why prologues are so annoying to readers. You basically have to start all over again. You just learned a bunch of new names, characters, settings, whatever. And poof! You'll have to start all over again. A story should begin with the story. Readers want to read the story they were promised when they pick up a book. They don't want to have to trudge through some another story before the real story begins. To a reader a prologue is just an obstacle.

This also applies to prologues in disguise, when writers think they're especially clever and just label their prologue as the first chapter. That is a slap in the face of the reader.


>>> "[...] many years before the main story, that it didn't fit in as a chapter"
I'm sorry to break it to you, but if it doesn't fit in the story then it is not relevant to the story.

[Astra]

And then you have prologues that take place after the story begins!

Overall, though, I don't mind them, as long as they're relevant.

[finn]

i always skip the prologue and then go back and read it after i’ve finished the book. like andreas said, when i pick up a book i just want to start with the main story, i don’t want to have to get through a prologue that isn’t yet relevant and that i’m just going to forget in two seconds. but when i read it after i’ve finished the book, it feels like a nice little bonus chapter.

[Rainy]

Thank you for the comments! I think I’ll make it more of a flashback later, when it is important rather than right at the beginning. I’ve always read prologues as a reader but I do get the other perspectives of it, which is something I do have to consider now being a writer.

[Kaje]

I've done a few; sometimes they really are the way to tell the reader something vital about a character that they need to know from the start. But if possible it's far better to dribble the info into the narrative, or do brief flashbacks. The risk with a prologue is that if it's good, you suck the reader into that place and time, and then the time skip is like a dump of cold water, throwing them out of the story they now love, and forcing them to connect with it again.

If you do one, IMO it should be very short, and contain just some single vital piece of info they need to dive into the story. And then you have to assume that the occasional reader will skip it.

So not out of the question, but a last-ditch choice IMO.

[Meghan]

Wow, I've very rarely had the experience Andreas has. I find Prologues to usually be relevant to introducing characters or a plot. I'm not expecting world-building. I'm usually not too focused on the names as much as what's going on. Sometimes the prologue is too obvious and that's a little annoying.

The only time I really find a Prologue to be irrelevant is if the tie-in is over half way through the book or the Prologue ends up being completely unrelated to the story. If the flow of the Prologue differs greatly from the flow of the main story, then I might have the same hatred Andreas apparently does. But if it ties-in with the first half and the flow is even, I just consider it part of the story; story is story.

[Kaje]

Meghan wrote: "Wow, I've very rarely had the experience Andreas has. I find Prologues to usually be relevant to introducing characters or a plot. I'm not expecting world-building. I'm usually not too focused on t..."

I think the skill of transitioning from prologue to story is probably a big part of whether they work or don't.