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Romance writing: Tips for crafting that crucial first chapter

Romance writing is the kind that attracts a certain audience that enjoy the romantic wanderings through someone else's life. It's a kind of escape, though weak starts to a book can kill interest and mean that the middle pages may never be read. If you look at classic writers, there is a kind of pattern in the way that romantic novels are introduced, and all authors have strengths and weaknesses.

Have you ever picked up a badly written book and closed it before reaching the second chapter. I read many books, and love the art that writers display with the written word. Opening chapters that fail to grasp the interest of the reader can kill a novel dead, just as with other media such as film, documentary and even television dramas. If the introduction is wrongly played, no doubt the viewers head for the remote control.

So what are the factors that make that opening chapter so intriguing that you wish to turn the pages ? There are many factors all strung together that pull a reader into a book, and many make the mistake of thinking that glamor will attract the reader, when on it's own it is insufficient to make a book a hit.

*Introduction
*Portrait of the beginning
*Anticipation
*Curiosi ty

These are the factors that readers look for in the beginning of a book.

INTRODUCTION

Here, it can be either the introduction to the characters that play upon the stage of your story, from a past viewpoint, or from a present one, as long as the introduction adds that little carrot of temptation that leads a reader into caring about your story characters, and wanting to know what will become of them. Here, imagine the scenery, the ambiance, the sentiment and plant the seeds that will grow into a story that will be memorable. Many great writers do this amazingly, and even in the stark beginning of my favorite author's books where the scenery is somewhat bleak, the seeds that she sews play upon the emotions and get the reader to care so much for the leading character that they have no choice but to turn the page. It doesn't take glamor. It takes insight and descriptive powers to get the reader's imagination and allegiance to those people that interact throughout the rest of the story.

PORTRAIT OF THE BEGINNING

Think of the images that you are creating at the beginning of a story as portraits. Here, the colors that make the picture complete are written in words, and the reader wants to know what the heroine looks like, how they speak,

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