• If you can bore your readers with unnecessary details, you can definitely bore your reviewer.

I honestly never paid much attention to the first chapter while writing in the past until an editor pointed it out to me, and boy, was she right.

This is one of the worst things I notice while reviewing. A lot of writers tend to start their books the exact same way.

Now read along as I repeat this sequence of events in many stories; teen fiction especially (no offense).

- The MC wakes up to an alarm or to their mom screaming their name. A bonus if the voice happens to come from downstairs.

- The MC stands up and either looks in the mirror to go into how ugly she is as she describes her otherwise beautiful and sexy features. Or she goes into the bathroom and starts scrubbing that body.

- The MC goes into a boring monologue of her life from the day she was born.

- The MC goes down to eat a detailed breakfast and the family has a random conversation that has literally nothing to do with the main plot.

- The MC leaves the house and goes into either their friend/enemy/partner’s car and they drive to school talking about, once again, nothing of substantial meaning.

- They arrive at school and the MC once again STOPS the story to describe her relationship with her friends.

- Then the story actually starts. Thank God.

I’m sorry, but your book has already lost readers with the first paragraph. (Bonus if the MC describes her riches and the brand names of her possessions)

A second scenario is if the MC is woken by an excited best friend who barges into their room in the wee hours of the morning.

What time exactly do your characters go to school and do you know how much time some girls put into preparing for school? I don’t even put on makeup all the time and it still takes me a while to get ready, so why?

Why?!

Let’s temporarily forget the part about it having nothing to do with the plot itself and the fact that a story must start with the action or the scene that starts the chain of events.

At this point I have no choice but to ask, “What is wrong?”

Is your creativity so dull to the extent that you have to settle for something so basic?!

Introducing the setting of your story like some science fiction novels or other books is one thing, but why torture your readers with the BORING and absolutely unnecessary details of your character’s lives?

Please read as I bring up another hellish scenario;

- The MC is with her best friend discussing about a club. Bonus if the MC has a horrible fashion sense that requires the help of the beautiful best friend.

- The girls rush to the mall and get sexy dresses for the MC. Just so she can attract the attention of the male/female population. And here I thought people went out to just have fun and not hook up with random perverts who strip you with their satan-forsaken eyes.

- The girls drive to the club and happen to chat along the way about whatever happenings. My, we have such a nice weather today. Soon it will start raining werewolves with absolute solidified abs. Yummy.

- They arrive at the club and someone must at least do something to the MC before she locks eyes with the badass sexy hot sausage of a heavenly creature, aka, the physical entity of hotness itself. I shall not taint my eyes any longer -_-

- All hell breaks loose from there (I’m sorry, I don’t read on to find out especially when the blurb provides nothing)

The above are the most common I know (and I will still give another cliché one in the show and not tell chapter). Who are you kidding? What effect do those things have on the plot? You won’t die if you start from the REAL beginning of the story. All of those things have ZERO consequences on the plot. If you want readers to know more about a family situation or the character, a reader can read it as the story goes!

You as the writer should NOT butt in to be explaining things for the reader.

And you seriously expect reviewers to give you decent marks in creativity when they see this shit in the very beginning? That only means there is more horseshit to come and most readers are not here for that but quality stories to read!

For once, I’d even be happy if a story starts with a dude flushing his toilet only for a shark or whatever to crawl out of the toilet bowl and bite his ass off, introducing readers to something interesting.

Every scene in your story must have a consequence unless you are showing us an unusual creepy habit of a character that points to something major later on in the story. If a storm occurs in your work, you have to show us the after effects of it. Otherwise, why include it?

Okay, your MC eats cereal. What is our business with the cereal? Is the MC going to choke on it and die when she arrives at school because the cereal contained poison? No! Then what is our business with what she eats?! It’s common sense that human beings eat or they wouldn’t be standing, so why write it. You mostly don’t write about your characters taking a piss or shitting in the toilet and yet you have the effort to waste on . . . urgh!

Do not fret. I have made this mistake so many times in the past too.

Everyone knows you sometimes eat in the morning, so why take us through it. Best case scenario, your readers skip that crap and move a few chapters ahead to when the story actually begins. Worst (most common) case scenario, your readers drop the book;

“I just can’t read this shit I see everywhere.”

These scenes are stale. Please put a stop to this! It’s this kind of scenes I see in a book that always makes me want to throw my phone at the wall (except that I love my phone). And then you tell some reviewers’ that they didn’t read a work, when in most cases it is so similar that a reader basically knows what happens in subsequent chapters.

What happened to quality?

Readers want something they can read and enjoy. Most of you who even write this kind of stories would be furious if every single book by every single author was about literally the same thing. There is beauty in diversity and that is why you have your favourite authors! Yet, it seems you forget this small fact when you start writing.

Believe me, you wouldn’t even like any author if everything was the same.

If scenes are just there and don’t serve a purpose at all to the story, do away with it.

Filler chapters are not allowed.

Your readers did not sign up for that and this is one of the major reason reviewers can’t read past the first chapter; or they skip to where the story begins just so they can properly measure your work.

It’s good to include scenes to slow down the pacing of the story sometimes, but it has to relate with the plot or develop a character!!!! (I will discuss this in another chapter)

There is something you should know. If your book made a reviewer or judge unable to stop reading until the end, you’ve done exceedingly well. The complete opposite of making one frustrated before they are even done with the first chapter.

This is something people keep repeating but you should seriously write what you want to read.

If your first chapter doesn’t work for your readers, they are going to believe you suck in the following chapters and in most cases, this is very true.