Harry Dresden has 'em.
I'm only a few chapters into Jim Butcher's latest paperback in the Wizard-in-Chicago series (_Proven Guilty_), but I couldn't help noticing what Butcher did with the opening that really impressed me. It might not work for every style of writing, but it's definitely something for me to think about going forward with my own writing, and I figured I'd share it with y'all in case anyone but me would get something out of it.
The first short chapter gets us into Harry's mind, and introduce the moral issue that Harry's going to face in the book. Okay, fair enough. Good writing, good emotional stakes, but while everything's solid enough that I'd definitely keep reading, there's nothing to make me post about it.
But then we hit Chapters 2 and 3, where, in the space of a dozen or so pages:
1. Harry's given a task to accomplish that he can't let anyone know about for fear of betrayal.
2. Harry's told that he's being watched as a strongly suspected traitor.
3. Harry's given another task to accomplish that Chapter 1 has prepared us for.
4. The hidden demon within Harry rears its head, offering to help him solve problems 1 and 3, but at the cost of his soul... and the folks he likes, admires, and works with would -definitely- not think well of him if they knew.
5. And, because that's not enough, someone tries to kill him.
I can't recall having seen a character so beset with problems--all of them believable in context of character and situation--in the first 3 chapters. And were I an editor reading this as a synopsis-and-three, I can't imagine not asking for Chapter 4.
Now, I have no idea if it will hold up past chapter 5 (though I have my suspicions based on past books), so I can't say "run out and buy this Great Book," and I'm very sure that this type of opener is not for every reader, every writer, or every story. But for what I suspect Butcher is trying to do with this story . . . yikes. Nice work.
(crossposted from OWW-SFF)
I'm only a few chapters into Jim Butcher's latest paperback in the Wizard-in-Chicago series (_Proven Guilty_), but I couldn't help noticing what Butcher did with the opening that really impressed me. It might not work for every style of writing, but it's definitely something for me to think about going forward with my own writing, and I figured I'd share it with y'all in case anyone but me would get something out of it.
The first short chapter gets us into Harry's mind, and introduce the moral issue that Harry's going to face in the book. Okay, fair enough. Good writing, good emotional stakes, but while everything's solid enough that I'd definitely keep reading, there's nothing to make me post about it.
But then we hit Chapters 2 and 3, where, in the space of a dozen or so pages:
1. Harry's given a task to accomplish that he can't let anyone know about for fear of betrayal.
2. Harry's told that he's being watched as a strongly suspected traitor.
3. Harry's given another task to accomplish that Chapter 1 has prepared us for.
4. The hidden demon within Harry rears its head, offering to help him solve problems 1 and 3, but at the cost of his soul... and the folks he likes, admires, and works with would -definitely- not think well of him if they knew.
5. And, because that's not enough, someone tries to kill him.
I can't recall having seen a character so beset with problems--all of them believable in context of character and situation--in the first 3 chapters. And were I an editor reading this as a synopsis-and-three, I can't imagine not asking for Chapter 4.
Now, I have no idea if it will hold up past chapter 5 (though I have my suspicions based on past books), so I can't say "run out and buy this Great Book," and I'm very sure that this type of opener is not for every reader, every writer, or every story. But for what I suspect Butcher is trying to do with this story . . . yikes. Nice work.
(crossposted from OWW-SFF)
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