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We've talked about hooking readers with your title. We've covered the importance of hooking with your first line. Today, we're going to talk about the hooks that turn a good read into a page-turner--the hook at the end of the chapter.Mary Higgins Clark made a fortune writing short spare chapters and ending each one with a hard hook. Her books are called fast reads because no one can put them down. A hook is a tantalizing bit of information that compels the reader to keep going. The best compliment my editor ever gave me was sharing that she always had to stop mid chapter when she was editing my work because if she got to the end of the chapter, she’d have to go on.
Here are a few types of "end of chapter" hooks:
Bridging hook- In this hook, you bridge from one chapter to the next by picking up shortly after you left off. I'm sorry I don't know what book this example is from, but I read it once and thought it was delicious. A couple is fighting at the end of the chapter about whether or not to keep a stray dog. Finally, the guy says, "Ok, he can stay tonight, but he's not sleeping on the foot of our bed."
The next chapter opens with: "The dog snored all night."
It makes me smile every time I think of it. In only a few words, you learn a lot about the relationship and you certainly learn who really had the last word in that argument!
Danger, Will Robinson—Ending chapters with physical peril may be a cheap trick, but it works almost every time it’s tried. I heard Jessica Andersen reading an excerpt from her award winning Nightkeeper series at a book signing once. She very cleverly read a chapter that ended with the character's car careening out of control and plunging off a cliff. Well, you have to buy the book and keep reading then, don't you?
If you have a fight scene or a dangerous situation, use it to pull your reader forward. Save the resolution for the next chapter, not the end of this one.
L’amour—The same principle for a fight scene works for a love scene. End the chapter with a kiss of promise and your reader will keep turning pages. Don’t end with the cigarette moment or worse, having the loving couple fall asleep. Something else needs to happen to keep the momentum of the story going or the reader will turn out the light and wake up her husband!
Make it matter—Anything that raises the stakes is a hook. If the bank is about to foreclose, the sheriff shows up on the doorstep at the end of the chapter with the notice. This is especially important at the end of the crucial third chapter.
Why the third chapter? Because when an editor or agent asks for a partial, they want the first three chapters and synopsis. Hit them with a hard hook at the end of 3 and they'll have to ask for the full manuscript.
Setting end of chapter hooks is the best way to write a compulsive read. Who really needs 8 hours of sleep anyway?
Here's an example of an end of chapter hook from my new release STROKE OF GENIUS. In this scene, Crispin Hawke shooes Grace Makepeace, whom he's just met, away from the sketch he keeps covered in his studio--the one of the woman who's been plaguing his dreams for months:Anyone viewing the sketch would never believe Miss Grace Makepeace hadn’t sat for it personally.
And in splendid nakedness.
Now it's your turn. If you're a writer, do you have a favorite end of chapter hook from your WIP? Readers, what end of chapter hooks kept you up late?
PS. I'm also blogging at Seductive Musings and at Tracy Madison's Blog today. Giveaways at both places, of course! Please pop over and say hi!
