A prologue is an event or
action that leads to the beginning of a story. For instance, our mothers giving
birth to us are the prologues to our lives; it is what happened before we
were born and our actual stories begin.
From the previous blog (The
Very First Sentence), the paragraph I wrote about the five-year-old-girl
committing murder could easily be a prologue, and chapter one could be set
twenty years in the future when her childhood crime catches up to her. Wouldn’t
she be an interesting character to follow and get to know?
Whether you write a prologue
or not depends on your story. They are not necessary unless you need it to
build the story and provide important background information, and some agents
dislike them.
An event that happens in the
past, for example, can be a made into a prologue. What you don't want to do
with a prologue is dump a truckload-worth of information on the readers head.
Only provide the information that is pivotal for them to know before
you begin the story. Otherwise, try to pepper the background information about
the protagonist throughout the first few chapters. Also, a prologue shouldn't
be long. About 2-5 pages makes a good prologue.
Now, if you believe your
story needs a prologue, then what are you waiting for? They are fun to write. But
don’t forget to make that first sentence shine!
QUESTION: Do you like
books with prologues?
I do because they always
bring something extra to the story.
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