writersrott

[writersrott]

First Chapters That Don’t Suck...

✧ You do not have to start with action. You have to start with interest. I will read two whole pages about someone making soup if they’re muttering about killing a god while doing it.

✧Your first sentence doesn’t have to be deep, mysterious, or poetic. It can just be “The corpse wouldn't shut up,” or “The milk was cursed again.” Get (PLEASE) weird.

✧ Starting with a dream sequence is legal only if someone wakes up and says, “That’s the third time I’ve died in my sleep this week.”

✧ The point of Chapter One is not to explain the entire world. It’s to hook the reader and emotionally blackmail them into turning the page.

✧ Introduce ONE conflict. Not five. One delicious little problem to gnaw on. “Oh no, they’re late for their job at the magical DMV.” I’m in.

✧ You don’t have to name every person your character walks past. Save the lore dump for later. If you give me eight capitalized names and two empires in the first paragraph, I will cry.

✧ Dialogue is a great opener if it makes me ask a question. If someone says “Did you hide the body?” in the first line, I’m staying.

✧ First impressions matter. So if your MC’s first action is whining about something boring, I will throw them. Gently. Out a window.

✧ It’s okay to rewrite your first chapter after you finish the book. In fact, please do. Future-you will understand what the story actually needed.

[writersrott]

magical realism writers be like “everything is normal except the house bleeds on thursdays”

and somehow i believe them

[writersrott]

sometimes your brain really just offers you one banger of a sentence and then that's it for the entire rest of the day. creativity expired, the ability to think has clocked out for the day, context for as to how we even get to this sentence? sorry we're all out. this one sentence is all you get.

[writersrott]

who wants to be writing partners and like...hold my actual live beating heart in their hands?

[writersrott]

I have no outline tho, just vibes

[writersrott]

write a new scene → realize it contradicts something from chapter 3 → fix chapter 3 → now chapter 7 makes no sense → cry → repeat

[writersrott]

so soft it hurts