It doesn’t matter how many pages your story fills. Do you know how many pages you have to hook your editor?

One. Exactly one.

And that only sells the editor on reading the next page. That second page has to sell the page after that, and so on.

Even with a teeny-tiny publication like Arkham Tales, we get more submissions than we could possibly publish (over 130 in the last three weeks). And with most of them asking me to stick with them for twenty or twenty-five pages… well, I’ll let you in on a little secret. I’m looking for reasons to stop reading and reject a story. I’ve got to cull the herd somehow. And many writers make this easy for me by putting their weakest writing up front. That guarantees that I’ll never read the socko-boffo ending that compelled them to write the story. I’ve already rejected it.

It’s different when you read a published story in a magazine; you assume that the editor has already vetted what he’s presenting to you as worthwhile material. But when I tackle submissions out of the slushpile, I don’t go into it assuming that each story will be good enough for publication. A bad beginning has, often enough, heralded a bad story right to the end. So I read the first page or two or three, and ask myself, “If the rest of the story is like this, will I want to publish it? Heck, will I be happy to have spent the time to read it?” And if the answer is anything less than a hearty “yes,” I reject it. (With the best stories, I never ask that question. I’m too captivated to notice the turning of pages.)

Now, that may leave some otherwise good stories on the curb. I acknowledge that, but I don’t apologize. An editor’s not a captive audience, and I don’t owe any submission more than an unprejudiced read of the first page. After that, any prejudice I hold comes from what you, the writer, have put in front of me.

So how do you rescue your stories from the rejection bin? How do you construct and polish the opening of your story so that it draws me in with enough momentum that I’m predisposed to liking the rest of what I read?

If it were easy enough to give you the secret in a single blog post, everyone would be a terrific writer. Here are a few suggestions of what to do and what not to do:

- Don’t dump background info on me. You may have a a meticulously-realized setting detailed backstories for each of your character, but that doesn’t mean that I need to see all of it. Here are two questions to ask of all information you include in your story: Does the reader need to know this? And, Does the reader need to know this right now? (And yes, I know that Uncle Lovecraft began plenty of his stories with expository essays. But his best work relied deeply on setting and a sense of place; does yours?)

- Don’t write generic opening scenes. You need to get to the good stuff right away, not lead slowly up to it. No “main character wakes up,” no “main character stubs his toe and curses.” You’ve got to give me a hook. And that doesn’t just mean give me sex, violence, or blasphemy in the opening line, either. “Frank tried to calm his gasping breath as he looked around wildly” isn’t gripping if I don’t have a reason to care yet.

- Write with a voice. Good writers craft their prose so that the journey is as captivating as the destination. Even third-person prose should have some personality to it, not just a bald recitation of the events of the story.  Your word choice and rhythm should be unique and engaging.

- For the love of all that’s holy, proofread. The English language is a deft rapier, not a blunt club. I can understand and forgive a few missed commas and an its/it’s confusion or two in the course of a manuscript, but your opening pages should demonstrate to me that you know how to use words, punctuation, and grammar with expertise and precision.

These hints don’t lend themselves to a to-do list approach (except maybe the last one).  They are considerations which should inform your approach to getting your story down on the page.  Write me an opening that fulfills these conditions, and you’ll at least get me to read past the opening page… and then another… and then another…

Nathan Shumate
Editor & Publisher