Act 1: Introducing Characters

This will part 1 of a three-part blog series (whew!) on nailing your act 1. 

How do you decide what makes it onto these early pages?  How do you set up your story, giving just enough information about the world you’ve created without bogging down your reader with information dumps? How do you balance relaying background information to situate your reader with moving your story along?

Whether you’re a plotter or a pantser, understanding story structure is one of the keys to writing a strong and captivating hook.

“Every book a hook and the first chapter’s the bait.” – Chuck Wendig.

Act 1 is where you grab your reader or where you lose them. 

So, why is it important to nail your hook in the first act? Quite simply, readers are busy. Often you only have the first act to grab your reader before they start to glaze over—or worse, move on. In cases of readers, it’s a matter of a DNF. But in cases of agents and editors, it can be a matter of representation or getting published. Not to be overly dramatic here but act 1 might be the most important chapters that you write in your story. Act 1 sets the tone for the entire novel. It tells your reader how you write and just may influence them on whether or not to continue reading.

Act 1 comprises the first 15-25% of the book and serves to introduce the main character before pulling them into the heart of the story. Act 2 is the bulk of the story. This is your main character’s journey toward achieving their goal, opposing the bad guy, developing as a person, and more. Act 3 is when things get wrapped up. This is where the main character overcomes the problem, achieves the goals, and rights the wrongs. Got all that? Let’s zero back in on Act 1.

Act 1 usually contains the hook, the inciting incident, and the First Plot Point. Act 1 includes the sample pages you usually submit for querying, so you can know if you're nailing it? How can you make a compelling act 1? 

The hook is the very first scene (or sequence) in your story and subsequently your act 1. It—ahem—hooks readers into your story so they’ll continue reading past chapter 1. To be effective, your Hook needs to do three things:

1. Introduce the main character (or a Very Important Character).
2. Establish the main character’s everyday life. This gives us a sense of the stakes. What is the character fighting for? Are they fighting to return to a status quo? Are they fighting to upset this status quo? One of the worst pieces of advice is to begin your characters’ story on just another ordinary day. Why? Well, because most people’s “ordinary days” are boring. You want your reader to connect with your main character, but there are a lot of ways do to this without being boring. More on that in a second!
3. Show the main character dealing with an everyday conflict. Show the reader something that hints at the fact the main character is not/will not be safe/satisfied in their everyday. This kicks off your story’s forward momentum. You are letting your readers know that the main character’s life simply cannot go on like this and something needs to break. Soon. 

In any genre or age range, a compelling character is the key. No matter what genre you’re writing, your characters should always be front and center, regardless of if you’re writing a “character-driven” novel or a “plot-driven” novel. It’s the characters that get your reader engaged and invested to make them want to keep reading. You need to introduce an important character. While it is usually the main character, it doesn’t have to be. The best way to introduce a compelling character is to know them well. This is where those notebooks of notes come in handy (c’mon, writers, I know you have them!). Work out their voice, their perspective, their personality, their aesthetic, their astrological sign—their importance to the story. If you want your reader to care about them, you’ve got to care about them.

When establishing your characters everyday life, the reader is looking for the status quo. We want to see the character's life, their interests, their conflicts, their goals, their desires before the inciting incident hits and stuff hits the fan. Plots are built on conflict, so before we can introduce plot, we need to establish a status quo first. Think of this as your “ordinary world.” But this isn’t just your setting (that’s another post!). This isn’t just where your characters live but how they live. 

You want to paint an intimate and compelling picture of the regular old grind for your main character, a snapshot of their daily life before the inciting incident comes along and all hell breaks loose. That way, when the main character departs on their adventure at last, the stakes are going to be higher because we know what your main character is leaving behind and what is at risk.

Most importantly, we want to care about your main character. That means choosing an aspect of their status quo that's interesting and that will get hook us.