What to submit when asked for "sample chapters"?
For a submission (to a grant program, competition, agent, or publisher) that asks for sample chapters, which chapters do you choose?
For example, a grant program for unfinished works I'm interested in wants 3 sample chapters. They don't specify which ones. Do you go in order? Include the prolog? Add another chapter if one is quite short? Do three consecutive chapters that aren't from the beginning? Is it better to skip around, to choose the best chapters even if they lack context? Or better to show a story progression?
What chapter choices lead to the strongest submission?
2 answers
Typically agents and publishers want to see your first three chapters (or somewhere between the first 10 and 50 pages). Don't include extra. If you have a prologue, it counts as the first (since the first cannot be understood without it.)
This is the opening of the story, and most consider this the most important writing in the story, beginning with the first line as the most important LINE of the story.
This is because, if readers are going to put the work down, this is likely when they put it down. The first ten pages is when they have the least possible commitment to the story. Agents want to be grabbed right then, preferably immersed from the opening line, and they want those first ten pages to be engaging enough that the reader will be dragged through them, and that should be enough "time investment" and words (2500 in ten pages) to get the reader interested in what happens next, or to get them interested in your character and want to see what she does next.
Another reason to judge first pages and chapters is that later chapters can (rightly) depend upon context and character relationships and incidents developed or described in earlier chapters. Read cold, they can fall flat, even if they would be fine or great knowing what had gone before. That won't be true (in non-sequels) for the first pages or chapters. There, the writer must treat the reader as not knowing anything about the setting or characters or what is possible in this world.
That is difficult writing to do! The writer has bucket loads of information to dump on the reader, and how they do it, how they start a story cold, is the best measure of their skill.
I should think contest reviewers or grant reviewers would be interested in the same thing, as a test of skill. That is how agents and publisher's professional readers see it too. If they want to keep reading after ten pages, or thirty, or fifty -- If they haven't been irritated enough to quit -- That is an author that can begin a story and engage an audience. They request the full manuscript to see if you are also an author that can finish a story without disappointing the reader.
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This is from an agent's page at https://www.mariavicente.com/blog/manuscript-formatting-submitting-sample-pages
Consider the strength of your first chapter. Too often writers will submit pages from the middle of a manuscript because it is a “more interesting” scene or “shows off the writing” better than the beginning of the book. Your manuscript should shine from the very first paragraph. Of course the story is going to improve as someone reads along, but your opening pages should be captivating. If you picked the book up at a bookstore and read the first page, would you want to continue reading?
I have also seen other advice saying that if your first chapter is a prologue, however: skip it. Go to the first real story-chapter (or non-fiction - content-chapter.)
For more on non-fiction chapters, I like the advice here: https://www.lisatener.com/2011/06/book-proposal-tip-how-to-choose-sample-chapters-for-a-book-proposal/
- What chapters have particularly compelling anecdotes, examples, statistics or stories?
- What chapters answer my audience’s most pressing and common questions?
- ...use chapters that explore the range of the book
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