Soft hues of orange and pink painted a stark contrast to the hard edges of the city skyline. I clutched my coat collar to my neck as I pressed through the bodies crowding the sidewalk. That's when I saw her, shivering on the curb against the December chill. She wore a tattered hoodie and dirty jeans. No gloves. We caught sight of each other as I approached. The look of hunger resided in her gaunt face, and her surrendering gaze told me she had given up. I realized I could not just pass her by. It was the day I took a chance and my past caught up with me.

What is a hook?

Simply stated, a hook in narrative writing is the technique of creating an enticing beginning — the very first line or opening of a story — designed to capture the reader's interest. This hook can be viewed as the promise we as writers make to our readers about what's in store for them should they decide to continue reading. But there is more to writing the first chapter of a novel than coming up with a great hook. A number of elements need to be in place in those first few pages to pique the reader's interest, a symphony if you will. We will explore those elements here.

📌PRO TIP: If you're looking for inspiration for your next story's hook, you might try researching Best First Lines in Novels or Best Opening Lines to get those creative juices flowing.

📌NOTE: Look for the bonus section on book titles as hooks at the end of this chapter.

What elements do I need to entice readers straight out of the gate? Simple answer: Hook and Inciting Incident.

We know that in most successful stories, the hook is found in the first chapter. As writers, we don't want to take too long to get the show started. We want to pull our readers in by the collar and keep them in their seats until the final curtain. Most importantly, whether it's a shocking event or a family feud, we need to make sure that hook relates to the story in some way, even if it isn't immediately obvious.

Another important element in a narrative is the inciting incident. This is the Call to Adventure (which the hero usually starts out by rejecting). It's the moment when their world is significantly rocked by the conflict for the first time. This can happen in the first chapter, but it more frequently happens in the chapters following, usually somewhere between the hook and the end of the first act.

We mention the inciting incident with the hook here because, when done well, both are largely responsible for reeling in and holding your audience captive. As with so many things, timing is important. Within the first few chapters, the hook and exposition should build up to the inciting incident, landing both your characters and your readers in an unfamiliar and gripping situation.

8 Tips for writing a great first chapter

1. Startle readers with the first line

Shocking readers immediately with a jarring event, visual imagery, or confession will get them excited to read on. The Pulitzer-winning novel Middlesex starts with a doozy of a first line: "I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day in January of 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of 1974."

2. Begin at a life-changing moment

A life-changing event for a protagonist can be anything from winning a horse race — or losing one — to the discovery of an illegitimate child. This moment thrusts them into the conflict that they must manage, resolve, or overcome by the end of the story.

3. Set the mood

Setting the mood of the book right off the bat — whether it's doom, mystery, mischief, or snark — says to the reader, "This is what the world is, you're now immersed in it, and here we go." In the classic dystopian novel 1984, George Orwell's first line reads: "It was a bright cold day in April, and all the clocks were striking thirteen." Immediately, the reader knows that this is both a world they understand — same weather patterns, same terms for months in the year — but also a world that is foreign to them.

4. Start in the middle of the action

A classic hook strategy is to start with an action-packed scene. This method hooks your reader in two ways: first, with the energy of the scene itself. And second, by dropping your reader into the middle of the story without context, you'll leave them with questions that will compel them to keep reading.

5. Create intrigue about the characters

When writing first chapters, it's fun to hint at trouble, lies, secrets, and scandal, only giving away enough to get the reader interested. Another word for this is foreshadowing. In the book, I Know What You Did Last Summer, by Lois Duncan, she gets right to the note that unravels the main characters' lives immediately: "The note was there, lying beside her plate when she came down to breakfast." Right from the start, readers are asking: What is the note? Why does it matter? Where does it come from?

6. Include irony or dread

Dramatic irony is a literary technique that allows the reader to be privileged to the full significance of a character's words or actions while the character remains unaware. Likewise, irony can be a situation or event that seems deliberately contrary to what one expects and is often amusing as a result. One of the most famous literary examples of this is William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, wherein Romeo tries to reassure Juliet by claiming he is invincible to her family's hostility, but the audience knows that the young lovers are doomed to die.

7. Use a setting as the hook

Sometimes a place itself can cause or be the hook. A great example is in Stephen King's The Shining, where Jack is at the infamous Overlook Hotel interviewing for a new job. The reader thinks this is going to be a fresh start for him and his family, but of course, they're wrong. Starting the novel at the hotel — which is a character in itself — plunges the reader into the story.

8. Draw in the reader with a strong voice and relatable characters

In any work of fiction, especially In a character-driven novel, it's key to make the characters interesting and relatable to readers as soon as possible. A compelling voice can really make those first pages sing. You might try introducing your antagonist here to foreshadow conflict. A classic example of a strong character is Holden Caulfield from The Catcher In the Rye: "If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth."

📌REMINDER: Writing a great hook will get your reader's attention, but remember not to leave questions unanswered for too long or they will become frustrated. To sustain your reader's attention, answer at least some of the questions posed in your hook early on while keeping some information for later. Try introducing a new question every time you answer one, keeping your reader in a constant state of suspense.

The power of a killer cliffhanger.

We've talked about how to start first chapters, but what about how to end them? One of the biggest challenges to writing can be working-in enough cliffhangers to keep readers wanting more, and the first one is the most critical. There are a number of ways to curate a great cliffhanger. Here are just a few:

👉 Ask a question - Who doesn't want to know the answer to an intriguing question?

👉 Create an arrival - Rather than divide your chapters so the end of the chapter concludes something, have the end of the chapter begin something new. This can often be done effectively with just one sentence.

👉 Write a description - This description should connect to the plot or characters in some fascinating way, perhaps as a metaphor for some ominous thing ahead. An example from All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr does this nicely: The clack-clack of small-arms fire. The gravelly snare drums of flak. A dozen pigeons roosting on the cathedral spire cataract down its length and wheel out over the sea. Doerr illustrates a calm image as a contrast to the bombs that will soon arrive; the flying pigeons are a metaphor for the town's citizens trying to escape.

👉 Create a mystery - Who doesn't love a good page-turning mystery?

👉 Use revelation or surprise - This might be viewed as the standard cliffhanger: a letter from an ex-lover is discovered, the breadwinner is fired from their job, a hurricane blows the roof off.

👉 Crack a joke - Humor is just as effective as the plot to keep the reader turning pages. If you can make a reader laugh at the end of a chapter, they will turn the page just as quickly as if you had left them on a cliffhanger.

👉 Play with subtext - Subtext is the underlying message that is not explicitly stated or shown, and ending the first chapter with subtext not only reinforces all the other subtext within the novel, it also propels the rest of the book forward.

📌NOTE: Don't get bogged down with exposition at the start of your story. It can be tempting to reveal everything about a character in the first chapter: their background, their struggles, their secrets. We want our readers to connect with them, but there are other ways to clue your readers in without dropping heavy chunks of narration on them. The way your character responds to exciting news or a difficult conversation will reveal something about them. The same goes when you're setting the scene. Stick to drawing your readers into the story with intrigue, conflict or action. You can get to the nitty-gritty stuff later.

The connection between the hook and the resolution.

The Hook is the first beat that kicks off the story and pulls your readers in, while the Resolution is the final scene(s) in the story. The Resolution resolves any remaining questions about characters and plots, but more importantly, the Resolution brings the story full circle, harking back to the Hook to show how the characters and their world have changed since the beginning.

How do I connect the hook to the resolution?

The hook and resolution mirror each other literally and symbolically, showing both how things have changed and how they remain the same. There are a number of ways to frame your story and show that connection.

🏡 Setting - Your story may start with the character in his normal world before something happens (the hook or inciting incident). Perhaps, they go off on an adventure, either willingly or reluctantly. When the character returns to their normal world, they may see things differently because they have been changed by their experiences. Symbolically, the resolution shows us a new normal world. For example: In The Hobbit, we meet Bilbo in his comfortable home, which he is reluctant to leave when Gandalf asks him to go on an adventure. When Bilbo returns from his adventure, his home may look the way he left it, but it doesn't feel quite the same way to him.

👦 Character - A characteristic moment, one that shows the protagonist's nature or self-identity, is one of the foundational elements of a good hook, and it can provide an opportunity to create a link between hook and resolution. Let's say your character goes on this adventure and is changed by it, when they return to their normal world, they choose to live in that world differently. Moreover, the people who knew them before the change are surprised by these new characteristics. Just as the first characteristic moment is an opening snapshot of your character before the changes of the story, the second characteristic moment is a closing snapshot after the changes, showing the transformation. For example: (SPOILER) The character of Ironman, Tony Stark, is an arrogant smart mouth when we are introduced to him. However, by the end of his story, he is sacrificing his life to preserve the lives of others.

📕 Plot - When taken in the context of a story that comes full circle, we know something came before the story and something will come after it. The hook often happens in the context of what came before it. Take the illegitimate child, for example, when a character learns they are a parent after losing touch with the child's mother. The story is propelled by an event that came before, and the pattern will continue beyond the resolution, in this case, it's usually in the form of a bond that builds between father and child during the story. Whatever happens at the story's conclusion must be foreshadowed and set up from the beginning, both symbolically and structurally.

How do I connect the hook to the heart of the story? And how will that help me pitch my story?

Your story's hook and your story's heart are not the same things, but it's helpful to know the difference when it comes to pitching your story to potential readers or publishers. If a friend asks what your story is about, you'll want to describe it in a brief, engaging and concise way, focusing on the essentials and leaving out the extras. So, the sooner you figure out the difference between hook and heart — and how to best optimize both — the easier it will be to write your book and make your pitch.

🧡 Think of the heart of a story as its soul. If it's a love story, a whodunnit mystery, or an epic fantasy, that will be a fundamental aspect of your story's heart. But we're talking more than just theme and genre. You need to ask yourself "What point am I trying to make with this story?" and "What is my story really about?"

Here is an example of a pitch that gets to the heart of the story: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone is about a boy whose parents are murdered by cursed magic when he is a baby. He is raised in a cupboard by his awful relatives until age eleven when he learns he's a wizard. While attending a school for magic, he discovers connections to his real family and learns the value of friendship,

🎣 Think of the hook as something that catches people's attention. We've all read coming-of-age stories. We've all read ill-fated love stories. Without a hook to spark curiosity, readers will be hesitant to take a deeper look. To identify your hook, ask yourself "Why should the reader care about this story?" and "What is the single most unique element in this story?"

Here is an example of a hook that catches a reader's attention: Again, we will use our previous example. In Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, we are introduced to an ordinary man having an odd experience as he goes about his ordinary workday. Through his perception, we see people dressed in funny cloaks, and we hear whispers about the Potter's son Harry, which has this man completely flummoxed for most of the day. We are then introduced to a cat who turns into a professor, and from there we are hooked.

👇 BONUS STUFF 👇

Don't forget the title

As critical as the opening hook is, a catchy, thought-provoking title can function as a hook as well. It is truly your earliest opportunity to grab your readers. Book titles are a small showcase of your abilities as a writer. As such, it's important to come up with a great title that will show potential readers a bit of your writing skills. Think of ways you can interest your target audience with emotionally loaded language or a surprising combination of words.

4 tips for coming up with memorable titles

1. Keep it short. A short title is easy to remember and oftentimes can be more evocative and powerful than longer titles. NOTE: Beware of one-word titles. In the age of online search engines, a reader will pull up a list with many results outside of your book when typing a one-word title into the search bar. Expanding one-word titles to three or four words will improve your book's discoverability.

2. Make it evocative. Make it original. Best-selling titles are often evocative and contain compelling wordplay and imagery. Consider what separates your book from other books. The perfect title will clue your reader into what they will find when they dive into your book, but also what makes it special.

3. Consider existing titles. Perform an extensive online search of the working title of a new book to ensure that it hasn't already been used. Granted, with the surplus of published novels available today, it will be difficult to turn out titles that are completely unique. If you do find a published work with the same title as your work in progress, look at the published date and find out how popular the book is. Perhaps it's out of print, thus giving your novel a chance to stand out.

4. Be careful of inadvertent references. You don't want your book title to make readers uncomfortable or have them associate the title with a controversial topic, group or event.

📌PRO TIP: When generating ideas for book titles, here are a few things to consider: Character names (Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Don Quixote), Settings (Love in the Time of Cholera, Harlem Shuffle), Literary Devices such as alliteration or hyperbole (Gone Girl, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs)

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