Fantasy novels that open like this

[Michael K. Eidson]

I'd probably put this back on the shelf if I picked it up in the store. It's not that there isn't much happening in terms of action--I'm fine with that--but rather that the prose strikes me as flat and generic. The Durrell excerpt I posted has a lot of individual character. The same would be true of a writer like Peake. The writing interests me in and of itself, as well as the questions raised. if you're writing in a more or less generic style, you've got to open with a pretty good hook to keep my attention.

The question being, however, what would an editor or agent today accept? From the Wheeler excerpt, we can see that an editor would accept a manuscript that starts without action or any overt hook. (Unless you consider the "patch of white hair" an overt hook. I don't think it is much of a hook, but maybe teens, the target audience, would.)

So we can see that editors will accept manuscripts without action or overt hooks in the beginning paragraphs. I'd think they'd be even happier to accept a manuscript with standout prose. I think the answer to your question is that today's editors or agents would accept a manuscript that starts like Justine, as long as the rest of the novel held up. Perhaps they don't receive manuscripts like that.

 

[Michael K. Eidson]

Mary C. Moore recently posted about first lines that might make an agent reject a story. #5 was this:

5. Your character is running/fighting/breathing hard

• We don’t know your character yet, so we don’t care what action they are doing. Shows you may not be able to create tension without using action.

Agents aren't always looking for action per se in those first paragraphs. Tension is what they want.

See the other 9 items in her list at Do Literary Agents Reject Your Submission After Reading One Line? ? Mary C. Moore

 

[Steerpike]

Steer, I've been thinking about this and I think what you're trying to describe may come down to writing that knows how to take advantage of the things that words can do that images can't.

In most modern writing it seems like the writers are just describing a movie running in their heads. You can almost call out all the camera shots and see the camera panning across the room as the writer describes it. This cinematic writing style is fine so far as it goes. But it feels like the writer is only writing because it's easier than making movies. It doesn't seem to be aware at all that there are things you can't convey with images, or story telling that is better suited to words.

The opening you posted takes advantage of the ability of words to convey what is going on inside a character's head. You can't really do that with images. You can suggest in general terms what a character is thinking about but you can't really get inside there. The only thing that comes close is the use of a voiceover, which is just slapping the words over the image rather than actually using the image itself in the telling. And a lot of the time it just comes across as cheesy. This is one of the reasons people thought Dune couldn't be filmed. Because Herbert spends SO MUCH time in the character's heads. And though it was eventually filmed, it was a much poorer version of the story, without all the nuanced internal monologue that happens in the book. It pretty much lost all of the thematic significance that Herbert worked so hard to achieve.

Words can help us explore characters, settings, events and themes in a way images can only suggest. I think the greatest writers understand this and use it to their advantage.

Yes, I think this makes good sense. I find with many writers who are just starting out, the urge to write a story as though you're seeing it on a screen may be partly responsible for their inability to get into a close POV with a character. I see quite a few writers who want a close POV struggle to achieve it.

 

[Steerpike]

The question being, however, what would an editor or agent today accept? From the Wheeler excerpt, we can see that an editor would accept a manuscript that starts without action or any overt hook. (Unless you consider the "patch of white hair" an overt hook. I don't think it is much of a hook, but maybe teens, the target audience, would.)

So we can see that editors will accept manuscripts without action or overt hooks in the beginning paragraphs. I'd think they'd be even happier to accept a manuscript with standout prose. I think the answer to your question is that today's editors or agents would accept a manuscript that starts like Justine, as long as the rest of the novel held up. Perhaps they don't receive manuscripts like that.

I think editors generally would accept it if, as you say, the novel holds up. I sometimes wonder whether, on par, it is a much more difficult sell to a genre editor than a literary one.

 

[Michael K. Eidson]

I think editors generally would accept it if, as you say, the novel holds up. I sometimes wonder whether, on par, it is a much more difficult sell to a genre editor than a literary one.

Are you concerned about your own work, whether you should "dumb it down" before submitting it? I couldn't imagine doing that myself, assuming my work was at a level that "dumbing down" was even possible. Writing of a quality comparable to the beginning of Justine may be beyond the capabilities of many of today's aspiring authors. Editors may be dying to see more stories like that, but not receiving them.

Sure, it would be nice to know exactly what goes through the editorial mind when determining whether to accept or reject a story. You know as well as I there are tons of factors involved in that decision. Trying to give an overall rank to any one aspect of the editorial decision-making process is bound to be a frustrating exercise.

 

[R Snyder]

I am reading Justine, the first of Lawrence Durrell's acclaimed Alexandria Quartet. I quite like how he opens this novel--I like how he gives us setting, mood, the voice of the narrator, and of course questions, questions, questions! I particularly like the last two lines.

There is no action to it. I like it for similar reasons that I like the opening to the Gormenghast books, I suppose. SF/F I've read recently open either with action, or with some quite overt hook--some phrase in the first sentence or two that is meant to leap out and engage the reader. I'm curious whether there is any current (say last decade or so) fantasy that starts more like this. If none come to mind, could you open an SF/F novel this way. Would an agent or editor take it? Justine opens thusly:

The sea is high again today, with a thrilling flush of wind. In the midst of winter you can feel the inventions of Spring. A sky of hot nude pearl until midday, crickets in sheltered places, and now the wind unpacking the great planes, ransacking the great planes...

I have escaped to this island with a few books and the child--Melissa's child. I do not know why I use the word "escape." The villagers say jokingly that only a sick man would choose such a remote place to rebuild. Well, then, I have come here to heal myself, if you like to put it that way....

At night when the wind roars and the child sleeps quietly in its wooden cot by the echoing chimney-piece I light a lamp and limp about, thinking of my friends--of Justine and Nessim, of Melissa and Balthazar. I return link by link along the iron chains of memory to the city which we inhabited so briefly together: the city which used us as its flora--precipitated in us conflicts which were hers and which we mistook for our own: beloved Alexandria!

I have had to come so far away from it in order to understand it all! Living on this bare promontory, snatched every night from darkness by Arcturus, far from the lime-laden dust of those summer afternoons. I see at last that none of us is properly to be judged for what happened in the past. It is the city which should be judged though we, its children, must pay the price.

It draws you in, so yeah, I believe an agent or editor would keep reading.