How To: Revising the First 100
how can I present the information of the book in the best and most engaging way?
Introduction
I recently tweeted about how I’m now paying special attention to the first 100 pages in revision. People seemed to like that thread, so I’m fleshing it out a bit in this newsletter! I must give the caveat that I’m no master of craft—and so much of publishing is luck (getting your book in front of the right person at the right time). I can’t guarantee anything, but as true as it is that nothing is certain in publishing, there are absolutely things you can do to increase your chances.
But that’s all trad pub is, ever—chances. Odds. Don’t run yourself into the ground because you think some ideal form of a book will guarantee you anything. It just won’t. There’s pain in the loss of control, but there’s comfort, too.
To give myself a bit of agency, I work on my craft when I can. I try and puzzle out my own writing process. I think about how I read books, and I let that help guide me. I know from slush reading and hearing from agents and editors that people don’t read far in books they don’t love. We hope that anyone with our full manuscripts will read the entire thing, but that just isn’t the case. Agents and editors have to DNF submissions to protect their own time and priorities, so you need to hook them immediately.
But how do you do this? I deconstruct my own books to mark out when things happen and why, and I put twice as much effort into revising the first 100 as I do the rest of the book. The first 100 needs to stand on its own, because if you’ve hooked a reader for that long, you probably have them for the rest of the book. I used to revise with all parts of the book equally in mind, and while you do definitely still need to follow through, I’ve realized that the first 100 pages need to exist on their own, and need to shine more than everything else.
*I’m going to use a lot of confident imperatives in this newsletter like “you should” and “you need” that aren’t true. All craft advice is subjective and fairly individual, it’s just easiest to write in this tone. Remember, your book is yours.
Overview of Steps
Write the book
New document, new me
Pacing
Character
Plot and World
Feedback
Tips and Tricks
Write the book
I don’t write partials, and I refuse to receive feedback on them before I’ve completed a book. That is the way I work, but that’s not the right step for everyone. As step 1, you need to write whatever it is that eventually needs to be revised, and while I recommend you write the entire book, I leave the specifics up to you and what works best for you.
I write the entire book because I need to know the basic story before I can revise anything, and because a truly polished 100 pages reflects back the middle and end of a book. But I can see why some people might prefer to edit as they go and make sure their first 100 pages are “right” before they start building the rest of the book on top of it.
The rest of my feedback is guided by the notion you have the entire book written (doesn’t need to be written well, just written).
New document, new me
Once I have a standing draft of the full book, one that I think works—even if it doesn’t work amazingly—I pull the first 100 pages into its own Word file. I do this to cut through the static—the first 100 need to be nailed down on their own terms. They don’t need a complete story, but they do need a completed set up and tightly woven storyline. I take a look at the first 100 on its own terms, reading it over (potentially in a new format, like PDF or on my Kindle) and then I ask myself a series of questions.
Pacing
Question 1: does the pacing move at a steady trot?
If it’s too fast the reader won’t be able to relax into the world and the characters’ motivations, so they’ll stop reading. If it’s too slow, the reader will get bored and stop reading.
Not good, we need people to keep going. I evaluate every chapter on its own terms and I’m ruthless about it. The first 100 usually need to move along pretty briskly, so any place where I slow down too much and start seeing paragraphs of exposition, I cut and move elsewhere.
The first 2 chapters get special attention here—I’ve had very bad luck including my inciting incident in chapter 1, so I make sure it’s in chapter 2 or 3 and chapter 1 contains a baby inciting incident that mainly functions to show what matters to my main character. In other words, my chapter 1s always start with something slightly out of the ordinary that foreshadows the main conflict without being thee main conflict. For instance, in my current WIP my main character wants to join a college band, come out of her shell, and live a perfectly ordinary life, but the main conflict of the book is about her generational magic making it impossible for her to live a normal life. In chapter 1, the baby inciting incident is a close encounter with the drummer of said band that brings the MC onto the band’s radar.
This sets up my character’s goals and starts the book with something a bit out of the ordinary. But the true inciting incident is in chapter 3 when a god from another realm summons the MC because he wants to use her magic for his own gain.
If I started with the true inciting incident, we wouldn’t understand what “normal” is for my MC, or know what she wants, or how her magic works. We need all of this to understand the stakes of her summoning.
But if chapter 1 was completely ordinary, the reader will be confused about what the point of the book is. So we start a bit slower, with the baby inciting incident, and focus on character.
Character
Question 2: do we know what the main character wants, badly?
It is perfectly ok for your character to not know what they want. That is its own kind of conflict and its own sort of personal stakes. But we must know the emotional state of your character, and it’s useful to establish goals (again, even if the goal is just “I want to have goals”).
Often this characterization gets overshadowed by the world and eclipsed by pacing that moves too quickly. The first question of the book is: who does this book follow? I like to set up little goals and big goals, 1 short term and 1 long term. Eg., for the aforementioned WIP, the little/short term goal is joining the band. The long term goal is figuring out what she wants in life and college, and getting the chance to be able to pursue it without her magic getting in the way.
Within the beginning of your book, I’d say we need the little goal in chapter 1, and the big goal by the true inciting incident. That allows the reader to position themself in reference to the main character, understand their personal relationship with the story, and trust the character to be a good vessel for the world and story. A reader doesn’t need to like or empathize with a main character, but I do think they need to understand them.
Plot and World
Question 3: what the hell is going on?
This is a question you should ask yourself and answer so that the reader does not have to ask themselves (unless it’s an awed, what the hell is going on?). DO NOT OVERDO IT. This isn’t an excuse to info dump and slam the reader with the world or jam them halfway through the main plot. This, in my opinion, should be the least visible of the three points I’m highlighting (pacing, character, plot and world). I say least visible, not least important. I say least visible, not that there should be nothing. This is the background to your story, and the way to flesh it out, in my opinion, is to have your character interact with it.
Instead of talking about a certain part of your fictional city, put your character in it. And so on! This special focus on the first 100 has to get nitpicky about making sure every word, scene, and chapter is doing triple duty—does it set up the conflict? Explain the character? Build the world? Subtlety is key here, and your character still needs to shine through.
What’s more, remember that you don’t need every single answer within the first 100 pages, or 50, or 30. You can unfold things over time, so while it’s important to give just enough that a reader has answers to questions right before they ask them, they only need them right before they ask them, not 10 pages previous (also, they’ll probably forget it if it’s from 10 pages previous and they’re still new in the world).
I like to break the 100 pages down a bit further into 75, 50, and 30 page increments. True inciting incident should happen by page 30, we should have at least one complication by page 50, by 75 we should understand the depth of the world. You can write out a list of all the major action points, then edit your chapter lengths and order to hit them by a certain page.
Think of it like this: if someone is only going to read 30 pages of your book, what do you need/want them to know? What needs to happen for them to understand the conflict, the character, and the world?
Same for 50 pages, 75 pages, and 100 pages.
Feedback
For the first 100 pages especially, I think feedback is invaluable. I’ve started sending only the first 100 pages to betas to get their feedback. It’s difficult to hold a whole book in your head; it’s much easier to hold 100 pages. Your betas can dig deeper into pacing, character, plot, and world within the set scope of 100 pages. You want them begging you for the next 100 pages afterward. A lukewarm “I’d like to read on, I guess” isn’t enough when trying to hook agents and editors slammed with a continuous flood of submissions. You need your reader in agony, you need your book living rent free in their head.
That’s why pacing is so important: you want them to blow through 100 pages without realizing it.
That’s why character is so important: you want them obsessed with your cast, enough that they need to follow their journey.
That’s why plot and world are so important: you need your reader to feel confident enough to proceed, with a firm grasp on what the broad arc of the book might be.
Ask for specific feedback and be ruthless about cutting, reorganizing, folding the book back in on itself, and even replotting slightly. I tend to think of this edit of the first 100 pages to be a bit less about content and a bit more about the technical: it’s about slimming chapters, expanding important sections, and rearranging timeline all in the service of the larger plot. Less so changing the larger plot. I.e: how can I present the information of the book (plot) in the best and most engaging way?
Tips and Tricks
Here’s a grabbag:
Keep a separate document open where you can dump parts you cut out for the sake of pacing. It feels easier to kill your darlings when they disappear into a Word doc instead of the ether, and you can then go over everything and try and weave funny scenes or good information back in somewhere else in a way that better suits the pacing, etc.
Swap formats: don’t just read your book in your writing program on your computer. Also read it on your phone, like it’s a Kindle book, or in PDF form on your computer zoomed out to see the whole page. This can trick your brain into reading more like a reader than a writer.
Again, pull the first 100 into its own document, don’t try to revise it in your main, full, book doc. It’s easier. Trust me.
Do it all twice: revise the first 100, get feedback, revise the first 100 again. You can then go back into the rest of your book depending on what changed.
Be specific with your betas about what you’re looking for feedback on, and judicious with implementing critique. You can’t do too much in the first 100 (again, go for a more gradual build), you need to do just enough that the reader isn’t confused or frustrated and wants to read on.
Conclusion
I have no idea if any of this works, but I think it does, because it works on me as a reader. Feeling confident in your book’s start helps you feel like you’re putting your best foot forward with agents and editors. At least if they turn me down, they’re turning down my best work. We’re just not a fit. At least if they turn me down, I won’t have the pervasive “but if they’d just read a little bit more they’d get it!” thought that haunts me.
You work with what you have, and unfortunately in trad pub you usually only have the first 30-50 pages. So I make sure I’m answering the questions I need to answer sooner rather than later, and whip out every trick in the book to keep my reader on the line. It’s an obvious thing that wasn’t obvious to me, and I hope it helps all of you up your chances!
-Kvita