How is this for a first couple of sentences in a new book??

a mark, a scar, a memory. but i. i prefer a triumpth. a triumpth over the pain that lies within me. when its dark, and i can feel the goosebumps creeping up my leg. i know. i know its getting closer. closer to a new triumpth. a scar that will be with me forever, an etch in the pale skin i leave red..............
How is this for a first couple of sentences in a new book??
Well, I guess I won鈥檛 be popular either then (see above poster). Yeah, I have to agree that this isn't a wonderful first few sentences. It reads more like a Goth鈥檚 poetry journal than a book I'd be interested in.





For a book, your first word needs to be a hook to get the reader to read the second word. Your first sentence needs to be a hook to get the reader to read the second. Your first paragraph needs to be a hook to get the reader to read the next, and so on.





The first 13 lines (or there about) are the most important lines in a manuscript (as, in a properly formatted manuscript, these will be the lines on the first page, which a publisher might only skim before discarding). These lines need to be the absolute best you can make them (thus, spelling and grammar).





I know of two tricks often used for the hook. One is to start IN the action (you have started before the action). I've even heard it said (exaggerated, really) that one should write a book then cut off the first chapter. The other trick is to start in a different POV or topic from the rest of the story in order to give critical information that will hook the reader (Rowling did this, Tolkien did this, Orson Scott Card, etc).





Also, use complete, complex sentences. If I may offer my own rewrite, turning your first seven sentences as a single one... "A mark, a scar, a memory, people call it many things but I prefer 'triumph;' a triumph over the pain that lurks in my veins, threatening me with goose bumps that creep up my leg when it is dark, when it gets closer." This is a bit of a personal thing, but you're sentences are so short that it feels like I am reading "See Spot Run." (See Spot. See Spot run. Run, Spot, Run. See the Reader. See the Reader gouge his eyes out. Gouge, Reader, gouge.)
How is this for a first couple of sentences in a new book??
ohh, i like it!
Reply:its pretty good.!!!
Reply:I like it! ... are you an assassin? ... waiting for your mark?
Reply:Pretty good. keeps you wonderin what will happen next.
Reply:......................raised welts, a badge of my triumph!
Reply:Oh, I'm not going to be popular today.





It's pretty awful.





Now, you can get hostile and defensive, or you can be open to a different opinion than your own, consider its points, and revise or not as you see fit.





It's an enormous conceit for an author, particularly an new, unknown author, to ignore standard capitalization and punctuation. Readers have a short span during which they'll tolerate it, probably no more than a couple hundred words, possibly much less. So off the top, I recommend you capitalize and punctuate to normal standards. If you skipped it because you're weak at that, you will never make it as a novelist. It's not all that hard to teach yourself.





Spelling matters. Submissions editors will discard a manuscript at the second or third misspelling. It shows a lack of professionalism, or laziness, when a writer doesn't spell-check.





As novel beginnings go, it's an interesting concept that teases the reader, but it's not really an adequate hook designed to grab the reader's attention and keep it. Yes, there are many novels that don't have a hook, but new novels by unknowns have them pretty much universally.





On the plus side, like I said, the concept and the feeling of foreboding come through very nicely. That's something to groom, work with, and build on.





Thanks for sharing.