How to write: hooks

Don't you love it when you read the first sentence of a novel and just know that you're not going to be able to put it down - that feeling of being hooked, and giving yourself up to it because you know you're in the hands of a master story-teller?

Once you as a writer have your characters, setting and a rough idea of a plot, make sure you have the best possible first sentence. You want to grab your reader's attention from the first word.

Here are some great sentences that sucked me into the story and didn't let me go:

My name is Serena Frome (rhymes with plume) and almost 40 years ago I was sent on a secret mission for the British security service. I didn't return safely. (Sweeet Tooth,  Ian McEwan)

The tramp stank of piss and some unmentionable human filth Gavin couldn't even bear to imagine. (Tremble, Tobsha Learner)

Despite the fact that Carol Jackson has to sit in a pram, she and her mother are going out together while mine is downstairs whispering with a perfumed woman in an animal skin. (The Hiding Place, Trezza Azzopardi)

In Melton Mowbray in 1875 at an auction of articles of 'curiosity and worth', my great grandfather, in the company of M his friend, bid for the penis of Captain Nicholls who died in Horsemonger jail in 1873. (Short story "Solid Geometry", Ian McEwan)

Each of those beginning made me want to read on. Each introduced a character in the very first sentence. A character who is already interesting. And in each, the language is simple and the situations complex, full of potential conflict an human misery and anguish - which we love to read about! Also, each has a strong and unique voice.

My novel A Hard Man to Love is free from Amazon from this Valentine's Day!

I love writing in my garden. I find it inspirational.