Prologues

Kathleen42 · Mar 15, 2009

lovesaphira said:
ok i have anothe question about prologues. How long should they go for?

Bet advice I can give, like RobJ, is to head to your local bookstore and start flipping through the SF and Fantasy sections (prologues are shifty creatures and can be found almost on any shelf but, over the years, they've developed a taste for geeky readers and like to congregate in the SF section).

Offhand, I'd say most of the ones I'VE read were in the 3-5 page range but I have no idea where I'm getting that number from.

tehuti88 · Mar 15, 2009

My prologues, I admit, are sometimes used to draw a reader in if the first chapter doesn't open with a bang. But I wouldn't suggest using them to cover up a slow start, especially since this leads to beginning writers thinking they should create a prologue where one really shouldn't exist. (My prologues, which are usually flashbacks related directly to the story, are thus necessary to the story and aren't created on the spot just to make it more interesting. They just happen to serve a dual purpose--as an actual chapter of the story, and as an interesting teaser opening.

)

I don't mind prologues as long as they belong and aren't infodumps or longwinded explanations of what's to come or what has already happened. (Action is better than explanations. If you need to give backstory, then tell it like it's happening--through action--like the rest of the story, and don't just passively explain it like many beginners' prologues tend to do.)

As for length, a prologue should be as long as it needs to be. Mine seem to run shorter than the regular chapters, but that's just because that's how long mine are. *shrug*

fancie · Mar 15, 2009

This prologue actually begins with a situation that the rest of the book leads to. It's two and a half pages long. Maybe it souldn't be a "prologue". I didn't really know how to start it all off. The story is a flashback to how it led to that point and then concludes with a decision being made. Am I off base?

RichardB · Mar 15, 2009

fancie said:
What is the best way to jump into one? Are they even nessesary? I was told if your story is a slow starter, having one is a great way to catch a reader's attention. Any suggestions?

I have to say I don't lke prologues much, for exactly the reason that it can be used as a crutch when the novel doesn't start well. However, I think they can work to set an undercurrent of a mood that the author wants to gnaw at the reader during the opening chapters-- for example giving a peek at the villains who are plotting behind the scenes and who will bring everything crashing down around the hero's ears in Chapter 8.

I cannot stand prologues used as backstory.

fancie · Mar 15, 2009

So I did bad?

RichardB · Mar 15, 2009

fancie said:
So I did bad?

Only in light of one reader's quirks

You will always have to annoy some readers to delight others.

Gillhoughly · Mar 15, 2009

:editor's hat on:

What is the best way to jump into one?

By skipping it altogether unless you absolutely know what you're doing. You don't drop one into the front of a book "just because."

Are they even nessesary?

Sometimes. But ONLY to include vitally important info to the story that the writer could not otherwise work into the narrative. Few writers are good enough at the craft to get away with it.

I was told if your story is a slow starter, having one is a great way to catch a reader's attention.

Whoever told you that was a moron.

I'll say again: MORON.

If your story starts slow, rewrite.

Any suggestions?

Open your first chapter with a paragraph that will distract an eyesore, brain-drained, slush piled unto death editor (or agent) from a subway full of potential muggers. Do that and you'll make a sale.

Most prologues fail to do that, BTW. They are usually a venue to tell, not show, and too many new writers don't get that.

In a lifetime of reading I can count on one hand the prologues I've read that were wholly necessary to the main part of the book. And even a couple of them could have been edited down.

scribbler1382 · Mar 15, 2009

Prologues have been bandied about here in the past. I think the most surprising thing I learned back then was that some people don't even read them. Of course, whether you as the writer use them is a personal decision. In the books I read, I don't mind them, and sometimes I read a chapter one and think "man, that was prologue in disguise".

But I agree with the others, a prologue is no way to fix a sleepy start. If your story starts slow, you should be removing things, not adding them. Cut the first scene/chapter (or more) and let that be your start.

fancie · Mar 15, 2009

Thanks for the heads up on this. I'll try work the info in a different way. I appreciate the input.

lm728 · Mar 15, 2009

I don't read prologues. I read chapter ones.

I don't think a prologue really matters--mostly it's just the MC's thoughts on the page, nothing else. In the bookstore, I almost always go straight for the first page of the first chapter--that's where the action begins.

You can try renaming the prologue ch.1.

blacbird · Mar 15, 2009

tehuti88 said:
My prologues, I admit, are sometimes used to draw a reader in if the first chapter doesn't open with a bang.

1. Does that work?

2. If so, why isn't it just Chapter One?

I'm with Gilloughly. I've seen very few "prologues" that are truly necessary, and among those, even fewer that couldn't simply be Chapter One. I think most "prologues" are little more than gimmicky affectations on the part of the writer, most jettisonable.

And Fantasy writers, who populate this forum the way moose populate my garden, are, by far, the most prone to prologuitis. I don't know why, exactly, but I suspect that many feel their fantasy world needs initial explanation to be understood, which strikes me as a symptom that they may not understand it themselves.

I read Fantasy, and really like good ones. It drives me up the wall when a writer explains the Fantasy World up front, before ever getting into the actual story. As a reader, I want to experience that world, not read a travelogue about it. Start by telling a damn story. I can get the "world" stuff as I go along. The moment I see the first word in a Fantasy novel is Prologue, I generally to the Mystery section in the bookstore.

caw

Barpaio · Mar 15, 2009

I've found a good way to go about prologues is to keep them short, many of the details should be a mystery to hook the reader, and should lead into a solid beginning. If one is weak, the other is compromised, and that goes both ways.

blacbird · Mar 15, 2009

Barpaio said:
I've found a good way to go about prologues is to keep them short, many of the details should be a mystery to hook the reader, and should lead into a solid beginning.

Why does anybody need to "lead into a solid beginning"? Why not just begin?

caw

Prozyan · Mar 15, 2009

Barpaio said:
I've found a good way to go about prologues is to keep them short, many of the details should be a mystery to hook the reader, and should lead into a solid beginning. If one is weak, the other is compromised, and that goes both ways.

Length has absolutely nothing to do with the necessity of a prologue.

MRevelle83 · Apr 4, 2009

Hello all. I have a question concerning prologues ever since I wrote mine months ago. It has been sulking away as I haven't started the novel itself, just in case you were wondering.

For the two novels I have planned, I realized that the prologues I have written may be too confusing, or worse, not prologues at all. Whenever I see someone mentioning a prologue it is along the lines of info-dumping.

For my stories I wrote what I considered prologues but are not info-dumps. In fact they are nothing of the sort.

What I had written was essentially a short story, seemingly a separate entity of the primary narrative that begins in the holy Chapter One. It had different characters, a beginning, middle, climax, and resolution. What's more, the connections between the short story and the novel are absolute but is not apparent until well into the novel itself.

My question is, did I make a mistake in doing this? I basically gave the reader a story and ended it relatively quickly and no connections will be made until well after they've started reading.

Don't get me wrong. I love the story and would like to keep it in if possible. Yet due to the length of time required for the connections to be made, it is possible that the readers will not understand (or tolerate) the method of storytelling I chose.

Any thoughts?

Dale Emery · Apr 4, 2009

MRevelle83 said:
What I had written was essentially a short story, seemingly a separate entity of the primary narrative that begins in the holy Chapter One. It had different characters, a beginning, middle, climax, and resolution. What's more, the connections between the short story and the novel are absolute but is not apparent until well into the novel itself.

My question is, did I make a mistake in doing this? I basically gave the reader a story and ended it relatively quickly and no connections will be made until well after they've started reading.

The prologues that I enjoy usually leave me with some burning question that is answered only much later in the novel. Does your story achieve that? In particular, does the resolution resolve too much? Does it leave some intriguing question unanswered?

I'm not suggesting that your story has to do that... but it should certainly have some clear purpose, even if that purpose is clear only later.

Dale

MRevelle83 · Apr 4, 2009

As a matter of fact, the prologue has everything to do with the 'truth' and instigates the climax, so yes.

The resolution of the short story does not affect the novel very much. In the case of both, these stories exist as such within the universe of the novel as well. So the protagonist(s) are aware of these stories, much like we are aware of Hans Christian Anderson tales and Aesop fables.

The point of the climax within the novel is not only to resolve the conflict, but to reveal the true meaning of these stories and how they relate to the actual conflicts.

I'd go into more detail, but I'm still at that stage (naive/amateur/etc.) where I do not like to give out too much information on open message boards. I'd be lying if I said that the irrational fear of my 'good ideas' being stolen was not part of it, because they are. They are only a small part though. I guess... I feel like I'd cheapen the effectiveness of a story by giving it away. I've been working on this for years so I'm overprotective.

However, I could always give the information through PM if anybody is willing to give me advice on the actual material. It's not written in novel form yet but the ending is planned out to the tee. It's just notes, but hey, it should be enough to be helpful.

Dale Emery · Apr 4, 2009

MRevelle83 said:
As a matter of fact, the prologue has everything to do with the 'truth' and instigates the climax, so yes.

If that's true, then the numerous people who refuse to read prologues will miss something essential to your story. And there are even people who refuse to read novels that have prologues.

So: Is it essential that you tell that story as a prologue, rather than weaving it into your novel in some other way?

Dale

Red.Ink.Rain · Apr 4, 2009

I always write prologues for my novels. Always ditch them before I query. Lol.

MRevelle83 · Apr 4, 2009

Essential? No. They'd just be missing out on the emotional pull of the 'twists', for the lack of a better term.

I could weave them into the story I suppose. I have written these prologues in its entirety, and is somewhat of a daunting task to take one narrative and weave it into (seemingly) a different one altogether.

It can happen though. Just another thing I'd have to think about and plan out.

One thought, though. If this were to be chapter 1, and it is revealed the narrative was a story being told to the protagonist as a child, would this be considered too much like a flashback? One suggestion I've seen many times is to start the story as close to the conflict as possible and this route sort of undermines that. And it may disrupt the flow of the story if I stop telling the current story and tell a different one for a small but significant number of pages.

EDIT:

One note of interest. The first draft (unedited) version of the written prologue clocks in at 2,689 words according to the word count website I used.

RobJ · Apr 5, 2009

MRevelle83 said:
Essential? No.

That's a good test. If your prologue isn't essential to the novel, cut it. Same with the first chapter, the second, the third, the dream sequence, the breakfast scene ...

Cheers,
Rob

scribbler1382 · Apr 5, 2009

I don't think I'd worry about the prologue until there was something for it to...er...prologue.

Prologues

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