I remember a while back we talked about disliking novels with writers as main characters. They were too inspective, we said, or maybe we said “navel-gazing.” I don’t remember. Today, here’s a list of thirteen ways not to start your novel, which look pretty solid.
Now, if you want an example of how to start your great adventure novel (I know you’re writing one during your lunch breaks), roll your eyes over this baby: “From the limbs of ancient live oaks moccasins hung like fat black sausages — which are sometimes called boudin noir, black pudding or blood pudding, though why anyone would refer to a sausage as pudding is hard to understand and it is even more difficult to divine why a person would knowingly eat something made from dried blood in the first place — but be that as it may, our tale is of voodoo and foul murder, not disgusting food.”
Bestselling junk there (taken from this year’s list of Bulwer-Lytton fiction contest winners).
I just finished re-reading Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency by Douglas Adams after a 20 year hiatus from my first reading. I think he broke about half of those rules, which goes to show that if you’re famous enough to have your name on the cover in a larger font than the Title, the rules don’t apply.
Thanks for the shout-out! That post has resonated with a lot of people
Greybeard–Douglas Adams is a god, so it doesn’t count. He could get away with anything. Also he’s spoofing a lot of bad novels with Dirk Gently, so he’s actually saying the same thing I’m saying. Only he’s a genius and I’m not.