Several
years ago I was asked by Rice University to speak at their summer
writer's workshop on the subject of hooks – those words that entice
a reader to stay beyond the first line. And, I've discovered, that
first line, paragraph, or page needs to be a dozy. Before I wrote my
first mystery, I was told that if I wanted to write one, I'd better
get a dead body in there pretty damn quick. So, the first line of my
first Milt Kovak, THE MAN IN THE GREEN CHEVY, is: “Her body was
found by her daughter-in-law.” See how I did that? “Body.”
That means dead, right?
While
I was preparing for my Rice workshop, I sat down on the bed and went
through every mystery I had in my house. The bed didn't collapse,
but it was touch and go there for a moment. I read the first lines
and paragraphs of every book and found the ones that grabbed. And,
strangely enough, they were differences enough for me to categorize
them. Why not? I like to be neat.
Slap
in the Face: Bill Crider's SHOTGUN SATURDAY NIGHT: “Sheriff
Dan Rhodes knew it was going to be a bad day when Bert Ramsey brought
in the arm and laid it on the desk.”
Goosebumps:
William Bernardt's PRIMARY JUSTICE: “'Once again,' the man said,
pulling the little girl along by the leash tied to his wrist and
hers. 'Tell me your name.'”
Too
Cool for School: Raymond
Chandler's TROUBLE IS MY BUSINESS: “Anna Halsey was about two
hundred and forty pounds of middle-aged putty-faced woman in a black
tailor-made suit. Her eyes were shiny black shoe buttons, her cheeks
were as soft as suet and about the same color. She was sitting
behind a black glass desk that looked like Napoleon's tomb and she
was smoking a cigarette in a black holder that was not quite as long
as a rolled umbrella. She said, 'I need a man.'”
The
Scenic Route: James Lee
Burke's THE NEON RAIN: “The evening sky was streaked with purple,
the color of torn plums, and a light rain had started to fall when I
came to the end of the blacktop road that cut through twenty miles of
thick, almost impenetrable scrub oak and pine and stopped at the
front gate of Angola penitentiary.”
I
could go on. But let's sum up. What questions should a reader be
asking at the end of the hook? My favorite, as a writer and a
reader, is to get the response: “What the hell is going on here?”
Always a good question – if the reader is hooked enough to care.
Then there's this: Is this person, this character I've already
decided I like, going to make it all the way through these
three-hundred-odd pages?”
“It
was the best of times, it was the worst of times” is now part of
the language. People who've never read Dickens use that line in
everyday conversation. That's a hook.
