When Did Your Heart Become So Calloused? When Did It Become So Hard To Put A Hand On A Shoulder?

when did your heart become so calloused? when did it become so hard to put a hand on a shoulder?

Not enough crusader kings content on Tumblr dot com

All New Information Belongs in the First 3 Chapters

                The final part of the series where I share the advice my mentor gave me after she read my first 30 pages. (This is part 6, find part 1 here!)

                The last big piece of advice she told me that may apply to stories beyond my own was that all new elements in a story need to be introduced in some way in the first three chapters. Past the third chapter, there's not enough time to introduce something new and explore it fully.

                This “third chapter” rule may adjust slightly depending on how long your chapters are, so I would aim for the first 10 000 words or so, or the first 30 pages.

                This applies to the introduction of characters, aspects of your world, or other elements. That doesn’t mean that every element of the mystery should be solved by the third chapter, just that the mystery should be introduced by then.

                After the third chapter, we spend the book building off of what we know—expanding the world, deepening the characters, revealing more information, etc.

                If it comes out of left field later on in the story, it’s going to seem random and irrelevant. If you want to pull off a twist, you introduce it without clueing in the readers that you’re introducing it. Then later, when the twist happens, they think “ohhh, it was right in front of me and I didn’t see it!” Far more fun than something that occurs from nothing.

                Good luck!

Winter in King’s Landing:

Jaehaera and Morghul

Daemon with daughters. I hope to see Rhaena and Baela more next season.