Prologue(s) - A great place for an argument.

But it's a reality, and there's no pretty way to say it, no one owes us any respect that we don't earn. The same is true of my gay MC's. No one here can or will argue that there is certainly a section of the reading populace who will put my book down once they see my MC is gay and that I won't be painting him as the devil incarnate, or, if they know ahead of time, won't even touch my book. It's a truth, my opinion notwithstanding.

 

That's true. But do you want to be represented by an agent who won't allow a gay MC? Just because some readers out there don't like a gay MC? So that means if you want to be published you shouldn't write about a gay MC? You should just call him heterosexual?

That's what prologue-haters are trying to tell us. If we want to be published we shouldn't have a prologue because some agents and some readers don't like them. We should just call it Chapter One. Umm. No.

 

You and me both. The fact that these people are the ones deciding what things become literature and what things are never seen is on the verge of terrifying. I've said plenty of times how utterly ridiculous all this is. The expectation that authors must pander to the tastes of people who give no mechanism for finding out what those tastes are is something on that sounds like lunatics running the asylum. That one agent says this kind of thing essentially says that all agents say this because without knowing you have to hedge towards safety. Things like this genuinely make me wonder if anything gets published by any mechanism except by absolute luck.

 

Neither do I. So we are in happy accord. And I won't waste an agent's precious seconds dumping a Prologue on them. Wouldn't dream of it. They are SO busy. I'll just creep away now.

 

Thank you. So ...what do you think of The X Factor?

 

I think this is actually very similar to the thread that was posted a few weeks ago about the story that may/may not contain insouciant rape as part of the setting. There's a choice to be made, and the options for that choice do not include forcing others to change their mind on the inclusion of said disturbing content.

I was told the very same thing, Jan, way back when I first started writing:

Don't write gay MC's unless there's an ironclad reason for the MC to be gay.
Don't expect anyone to pick up your little fairy niche novel.
No, I won't give you a crit. Eeeewwww. Butt-sex.

*shrug*

I made my choice despite the opposition, and the fact that some of that opposition has come around given the stonkingly large "niche" there is for LGBT writing really has/had nothing to do with my choice.

 

But even if it hadn't become an acceptable niche, would you have continued to write gay protagonists having gay sex? Or would you have given in and done things 'their way,' just so you could get published?

Guess what? I'm going to continue to write prologues, if I think I need one. And continue to read them as well. Because, guess what again? They DO get published.

 

Prologues CAN be very good and effective, but too often writers use them as a means to info dump a ton of back story rather than gradually distributing that information into the story in an organic way. This can make prologues clunky and a drag to get threw at times.

 

No, I would have trudged on. Again, the fact that the LGBT "niche" proved to be more than just a niche was never a part of my choice. I was writing gay protags in highschool, in the mid 1980's, when Amazon and ebooks were Science Fiction.

My point to this is: my choice is my choice. There are still whole swaths of the reading public who disdain LGBT writing and I am sure there are more than a handfull of agents and editors who think, "Ugh, not another little fag novel. Every fucking fag needs to tell his little 'rainbow story'... Circular File! Next!" That's an ugly thing to say, but I know it's being thought. It doesn't deter me.

 

*ahem* It turns out this isn't a thread just yelling about agents.

So...

The question here is about what is necessary and what isn't. If a prologue isn't necessary then, well, it's not necessary. I'm not quite hardline enough to say that anything unnecessary should be cut, even if it's good or fun or thematic. But if you don't need it you should certainly be thinking hard about it. But there's plenty of reasons why a prologue is needed (or at least works well) and why you'd want to call it a prologue rather than anything else. If you don't have numbered chapters or you need to introduce characters in a specific way that isn't amenable to being a first scene or you have a conceit that is really important to communicate that would be hard to do while throwing characters at you as well then yeah a prologue works.

As for 'prologue vs chapter 1' - Personally I think that if your first part isn't obviously immediately connected to the main narrative you shouldn't call it chapter 1. It's about expectations. If something is chapter 1 and the characters in it are never heard from again, that's kinda incongruous. If it's a prologue then it's telling me that this is a standalone vignette that may or may not be connected to anything else.

From my work; in my first book there is a prologue. The characters aren't really around in the rest of the book and it's just a short little look into the books world. It's funny and tells you the core conceit which sets up the stakes involved so that the reader clearly understands them without dropping exposition on them. Every character in the book already knows the bielection is a huge deal and in the last week (where the narrative takes place) they just wouldn't be asking each other 'Wait can you explain for the reader why this matters again?'. So it's in the prologue. We see the setting, we get the stakes, we get a feel for the books tone and humor and it covers all the background that needs to be placed right at the front of the book and wraps it up in a naturalistic way. That's a prologue that, in my opinion, should be a prologue.

In my next books there isn't a prologue. There is a still a 'before the narrative' section that introduces the setting, the two main characters and how they found each other that one night ten years before the story really kicks off but it directly leads in to the next chapter. The reader is left to fill in the (rather sad) blanks of the last ten years but we see where they started then see where they are today and knowing both we understand perfectly how their relationship is. That's not a prologue. That's just part of their story. So it's called chapter one.

 

With the frequency with which this particular question pops up - To Prologue or Not To Prologue - and all sides having a very good idea as to what the expected gamut of answers is going to be, I am often left wondering if the question is really the question or if there is a different question that's not being asked.

Am I prologuing well?

Should I have one or not feels like a meaningless question because the answer is always: Depends on what you wrote and how you wrote it. Hence, the set of answers feels equally meaningless and random.

Perhaps we need to address the question, not the answers.

 

I've heard multiple times that a good prologue doesn't have anything essential to the story, because a lot of readers skip them. That's seems odd, though because then why have it?

 

Sorry, your questions got swamped by the argument, didn't you? Ach well. Apologies....

It's hard to say what the answer should be. It depends on what you mean by easing into.

The general use of a prologue is to introduce something that is necessary for the reader to see and understand, but in a way that sets it apart from the rest of the narrative.

This can be an event set significantly in the past (or even the future), leaving a time gap between that chapter and the rest of the story. Or sometimes a prologue is presented from the point of view of a character who either won't appear in the story again, or won't appear as a POV character again. Sometimes it can be an event taking place at the same time as the story (or just before) in a significantly different setting—like something happening in a far off land that directly affects the rest of the story, which takes place 'here.'

I've also seen prologues that are simply the thoughts of one of the characters, either from before the story starts, or from years later, when the character is looking back on what happened. These are usually very short bits, sometimes only a paragraph or two. I've also seen these presented with no title at all, almost as if it's a quote or something.

If any of these things are what you mean by 'easing into,' then you can certainly start with a prologue.

If you mean 'starting slowly, from where things/events/people are now' however, that's usually not what a prologue calls for. Just take your time getting into the story. As long as you have an intriguing idea contained in the first couple of sentences, you don't need to rush your opening. Give the reader time to settle, but stay in the Chapter One, Chapter Two format. And of course, make the leisurely start interesting, loaded with personality, intriguing ideas and promise of much more to come.

 

I totally support the idea of learning to write good prologues and learning when to use them. Totally. I also support the notion that many people write and used them badly. But I don't think that's why this question keeps arising.

It keeps arising because folks keep telling other folks that if you write a prologue, lots of agents will not bother to read your stuff.

Why bother learning to write a good prologue, if nobody is going to bother reading it, because they are convinced it's going to be crap? It's the prejudice against all prologues that gets my goat, and makes me feel like I'm screaming into the wind.

Prejudice bothers me in all forms. It means people either conform to the lowest common denominator, or they miss out on stuff, and other people get hurt.

 

I agree with this, and perhaps I was trying to over-soft-shoe the point I was making and it got lost. Again, I can point to my own experience concerning my writing. Had I listened, had I heeded, had I thought others knew better than me as to what's right for me write, I would have given in long, long ago. I guess I didn't want to sound shut-uppie as regards this perennial question.

Let me say it more flatly.

People need to really stop asking this question because the evidence of prologues in published work is all the evidence that's needed. It's there. It exists. The question and the insecurity it illuminates would be much better spent simply writing it and then seeing if it works with readers, just like any other facet of writing. Are there pitfalls to the use of a prologue? Of course. Again, just like any other facet of writing.

Would I ever ask anyone if I should write gay MC's? No. Never. Fuck that. No, because the answer to that question is meaningless. Why would I ask anyone else what I should write? The only meaningful question is: Did I write this gay MC well?

 

That's exactly how I feel about so much in the business side of the book world. I have seen an agent say in serious terms that you shouldn't use ellipsis and exclamation marks in your work because 'good writers don't use them' but you should use semi-colons because they are just the height of style. She made no mention of situations where ellipsis and exclamation marks are being correctly and appropriately used, just a blanket statement that she will think that you are not a good writer if you make use of them whatsoever. And this is stuff I see over and over and over. So very much crap has been written pooh-poohing various features of books as being awful and that will make an agent throw your book in the trash as if literary devices (and even grammar) themselves determine how well a work is written. They don't at all.

I wouldn't even mind if this was stuff that might make an agent say 'It's a good book, but can you change this little niggly feature?'. But it's not. This is apparently stuff that means you won't even be taken seriously as a writer. This is stuff that is apparently so egregious that it doesn't matter how good your idea is some number of agents simply would not ever ever touch it.

And these people get paid to do this.

It makes me want to scream until I get sedated.

 

You shouldn't use words like -exactly or -very. They don't have real meaning.
ever ever is redundant.
sedated needs an ! after it.
Your opinion must be invalid because of these things.

 

Brandon Sanderson's debut, Elantris, has a prologue - it's like, half a page long, and excellent. It simply sets up Elantris as it used to be, as it should be - this beautiful, mythical place and after half a page, I wanted to know more about this place. I guess you could say his prologue is more of a taster, but it was used to good effect, and clearly relevant as contrast since Elantris by Chapter 1 was no longer the way it should be.

On the other hand, James Patterson's erm... I've forgotten the book title. The one about Max the mutant kid with wings, and she's with like 5 other mutants like herself and they'd set up a life for themselves after escaping from the labs. That one has a prologue too. And it was absolutely needless and rubbish. It sets up good tension, I grant it, and would have gripped its target audience (YA). However, everything the prologue revealed to the reader is then revealed more slowly throughout the next few chapters. So, what was the point of the prologue at all? All it did was erase all sense of tension throughout the next few chapters as actual things were happening because instead of being tense and wondering what the hell is going on, I already knew, only now I am being forced to re-read all the same information in a different format. Patterson is, of course, a seasoned writer - that might have been why he got away with it.

A good prologue ca greatly enhance a book. A bad prologue can ruin an otherwise good book. As with most things, if you know how to use the tool and use it well, then you're fine. If you don't, then it's best to leave it out of the book you're hoping to publish. It's more about whether you actually know how and when to use a prologue, rather than whether it's a "good idea" per se. It's good if your story needs it and you can do it well. It's bad if that's not the case, that's all.

 

Of course you get paid to have your opinion so yours is obviously is far superior to mine.

And the worst thing here is that agents make absolutely no effort to tell us 'Seriously I fucking hate apostrophes' or anything. Nope, you are sending your book to people who may or may not hold irrational views on what constitutes a book (to the point where sometimes I feel I might be better served sending an agent some cinnamon or an expressive dance instead of words) and never knowing why they decided not to take your work. Is my work shit? Or did I just send it to a man with a desk made out of bees? I'll never fucking know! Writing! This is how to make good books!

 

Agents are not a monolith.

I think I've said this before, but - writers get caught up in writing the "perfect" book and the "perfect" query and the "perfect" summary in the "perfect" font, and that's what's making writers frustrated, that idea that it's possible to get things objectively perfect. It's not. This is a creative field. Everything's subjective.

Some agents hate prologues, some agents hate something else. That's fine. When you query, query lots of agents. The agents who hate prologues will throw your book out, the others won't. Your book wasn't right for the agents who hate prologues, and that means they weren't the right agents for your book.

Back in the day when you had to print out and mail a physical copy of your MS to each agent, I can see how it would be frustrating to not get clearer guidelines. But today? It takes twenty minutes to do some basic research on an agent and put together a query package according to that agent's specifications. So if you send your book with a prologue to an agent who hates prologues, or your cheeky query letter to an agent who hates cheekiness, or do anything else that means you've sent an MS to an agent who doesn't want it - big deal. Twenty minutes. (Probably less than that once you have your system properly set up).

Write your story the way you think is best. Get some feedback. Rewrite as needed. Then send the damn thing to as many agents as it takes, if getting an agent is an important step in your desired publication route. Most of them won't want it. But you only want one of them anyhow.

 

Aren't most agents paid on commission? They only get money from the authors they've already got contracts for.

So... they're not paid for this, just like I'm not paid for finding new clients. That's biz-dev work - you've got to do it, if you want to be bringing new people in, but it's always going to be a lower priority than the stuff that's actually making you money right now. And you get really good at filtering out the shit fast. For me, rejecting a couple of potential good clients is more than worth it if it speeds up rejecting the fifty bad ones. I've only got so many hours to throw at it. Doesn't seem unreasonable to assume literary agents think the same way.

 

I'm sorry but I've never sent a query in my life that took me twenty minutes to set up.

I've spent a day or more doing the bloody silly things that agents tell me to do; that's even before I start trying to research agents and tweak specifically to them. This is just dealing with the fact that seemingly every agency wants a different length of sample, different length of synopsis, different kind of synopsis and a different style of letter. I have only seen one or two agencies where I could just copy and paste something I already had. Everyone else made me sit and write stuff specifically for them to hit the specific notes that they ask for, while still trying to actually make my work sound worth buying. Even when I can use stuff on my harddrive I still need to double check every damn thing, check that it's formatted right for the agent and in the right file format.

It's this stuff that is the problem here. My experience has been that it's so much work submitting stuff. The feeling that I've spent a day that I want to spend actually writing (or even just earning money and paying my rent) to submit something that an agent could just see the word prologue and throw out is that kind of thing that inspires deep, sucking nihilism. This is why we worry so much about writing things to be as safe as possible. In the grand scheme of things we might be able to put out dozens of queries but by the time I've done that I could literally have written another book.

 

I don't know about others but that's not what I'm saying. I think many of them should be chapter one because they're chapter one--they're the start of the story. The ones that aren't the start of the story, but are just info-dumps, should be dumped: not to get an agent, but because they weaken the story.

As for queries, the first one took me forever because I was so nervous. After about 10 queries it took me under five minutes to throw something together.

 

I've only sent out a few queries so far but I haven't included the prologue. The query requirements usually say something along the lines of "Send the first 3 chapters" or "first X number of pages"

 

I think a big part of writing is getting the reader curious. That's what makes the reader continue reading. If they aren't asking questions, and reading on to find answers, I'm not sure they'll stick with the story for long.

At least, that's how I look at it. I could be way wrong.