Post History

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/34228
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/34228
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

"The purpose of the book is to convince..." That is likely the source of your problem right there. If a book is didactic or polemical in nature, it is generally only of interest to those who support that message and only of interest to them while it is actually preaching that message.

A book can certainly have a didactic or polemical effect, but it has to a secondary effect. The primary effect has to be to portray a real human being in a recognizable way. We have to look at the character and say, ah, yes, there is a human being. We are social beings and we love the company of others of our kind. A book begins -- must begin -- by placing us in the company of a human being whose character and prospects can engage our interest.

You are going to hear a lot about starting with a "hook", but a hook has to catch in flesh before you can reel anything in with it. No event, no crisis, is of general interest until it happens to a human being we sympathize with. And sympathize here does not mean approve of, it means recognize as sharing our human frailty. They don't have to look like us. We don't even have to like them. But we have to recognize them as human. Once we recognize them as human, we begin to care what happens to them.

Original score: 33