The Art of Writing: How to Write Bestselling Novels

Anchoring: How to Start a Chapter

(NOTE: I can't take reading requests since most of my time is taken up by my family and running a small business.)

Let's start with a simple, easy-to-learn skill that you can immediately implement in your writing today--anchoring.

There's a fine art to starting chapters, and a big part of it is anchoring.

Think of the beginning of each chapter as painting a picture in the mind of the reader. Technically, it's like you're giving paint to your readers and directions for painting their own picture of the scene. It's a joint art project in our heads, which is pretty cool.

A lot of people believe the old way of writing is the way to start chapters, which is to describe the setting in detail for an entire paragraph or more, then add in a character and an action. This couldn't be farther from the truth in today's market. That works great for movies because they're a visual medium and setting is quick and easy to establish. But it's a horrible way to start a book chapter.

Think of it this way: if you start with a setting, the reader has no idea who the character is or what they're doing, and those two things are what are most important to the reader and story. If we just have a setting, we aren't sufficiently anchored in the scene.

Likewise, if we start with dialogue, we're missing character, setting, and an action. Rules can be broken, but if you break rules, do it with amazing style, or don't do it at all. If someone is speaking at the beginning of a chapter, it's just a talking head in the mind of the reader until they have a character attached to it. And even at that point, there's no setting, so it's just a floating head. So the reader needs to be anchored better in the scene.

So what do you need to properly anchor a chapter with the first sentence? You need thee important things:

1. Character
2. Setting
3. Action (an action)

Here's an example:

Ian crouched around the corner of the Old City tunnel, waiting for the Hunter to approach.

Character: Ian
Setting: Old City tunnel
Action: crouching

Notice how you immediately know which character is in the scene, where he is, and what he's doing. It's a stripped down, simple sentence, but it anchors the reader effectively. You can dress up your sentences if you like or scale them down. It all depends on your style, what your story needs, and how it's being told. Different types of stories require different styles.

When it comes to the opening sentence and paragraph of your novel, the rules change a bit, but we'll save that for another chapter. Also, since anchoring is only part of the equation, and a rule that can easily be broken with style, in another chapter, we'll explore how to start chapters with impact so they can really grab the reader's attention right away.

ASSIGNMENT

Now, take this technique and immediately implement it into one of your current writing projects. Do it to the beginning of every chapter until you're happy with all of them. Then start writing a new chapter where you have to use it again. That's the proven best way to get a new skill ingrained in your brain so it becomes natural to you when you write from here on out. Good luck!

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