Year of the Rabbit Blog Hop!

Easter involves all sorts of fun and family get  togethers. It also involves candy.

I can't send everyone sweets but...

I do have mancandy for you.

Sometimes a little goes a long way.

I'm starting to really like curly hair on men.

Is that the French flag?

Place a new twist on wet t-shirt.

Shhhh...

Oh yeah, the cover of my coming release.

Three days of hell, in charge, and running out of antacids.

As the pack’s Beta, Robert needs to watch over the Vasi werewolf pack for a few days. He hates the responsibility, but his job is to dissolve any problems while his alpha honeymoons. Nevertheless, trouble comes to town and her name is Esther. She's beguiling, beautiful and picks his pocket. Although Robert doesn’t trust her, he still wants to possess her.

Esther arrived in Chicago with the intention of slaying a vampire named Daedalus. While trailing her quarry, she encounters Robert who unhinges her world. He doesn’t know her trade, and she doesn’t know his connection to the vampire. Disturbed by her attraction to this unusual werewolf, she can’t decide which prey to hunt. The one who’s stolen her heart or the one who’ll fill her bank account.


Hot graphic werewolf sex, growing body parts, and one pissed off Nosferatu.


Excerpt


ps. I'm guest blogging at Whipped Cream Reviews. Leave a comment THEIR SITE and get entered to win a Nook or 150$ GC.

Annie Nicholas

First Chapter

Your first chapter is the salesman of your novel. Most readers will read the first  pages of a book before purchasing it, some will go as far as reading the whole first chapter. You have about two thousand words to grab that person’s attention and keep it.


How do you do that?

Think about the movies. I don’t know if you’ve seen Matrix but I’m going to use it as an example. Trinity, the heroine, is sitting at a computer having a conversation with a mysterious person talking about another, the hero, which we don’t know yet. Right away it sets questions in our minds. Like a first line of a novel. Then the police and Guardians attack her. There’s a spectacular chase scene where Trinity barely escape with her life and ends with a cliff hanger of her disappearing in thin air. Makes you want to stay and watch the rest of the movie.

That’s how a first chapter should be; just enough information to wet a reader’s curiosity, action to grab their attention, and a cliff hanger ending to make them want to turn the next page.

Doesn’t need to be a chase or car crash or fight but it can’t be boring. If you start your book with backstory or description the reader gets bored. Begin the story in a moment of change. Action is what draws the reader along. You can spread details about the past as the story progresses.

How can you improve your first chapter skills?

Read the first chapter of your favorite book slowly. See how the writer draws your attention and how. What important event takes place? How much description is used and how much history is given? You don’t need to write the answers. I just want you to study the chapter from a writer’s perspective.