Free HOOK Edit: To begin with, Marlowe was dead—

To begin with, Marlowe was dead. The police dispatcher said that over the phone, when he broke into Ben’s sleep at five a.m., and the coroner’s assistant said it again, to Ben’s face. Marlowe had been dead at least seven hours, shot and dumped in a filthy alley.

The assistant was pear-shaped, dressed in a black suit, his short neck balancing a head that resembled a soft-boiled egg, gluey white and hairless. He stood beside a sleek dark van, meticulously placing thin metal instruments inside a black leather satchel. Two other vehicles—a brown sedan and a black and white police cruiser—stood at careless angles to the van. All headlights blazing, the three cars illuminated a small island in a sea of fog that filled the street. Red and yellow lights on the roof of the cruiser turned lazily, splashing the gray with murky color.
—Michael Wright

Developmental Edit

Great hook—“To begin with, the main character died.” Too bad for you reader people—now you have to keep reading to find out what happens after there’s nobody in the story!

Tense? check
Detailed? check
Raises a question? check Who killed Marlowe?
Drop-kicks us off the end? check Almost. We’ve gone from bright lights and efficient coroner’s assistants to gray murk, which is a good mood transition. We could use one more detail on the end to slam dunk us into the story. But there’s an interesting issue here that I’ll mention in the discussion on structure.

What does this paragraph tell us about the book we’re starting? A character named Ben has been waken by the police to go to the site of a murder and talk to the coroner’s assistant. Ergo: Ben is probably a detective.

Do I want to follow this character through a whole novel? At this point all I know about Ben is that he’s willing to get out of bed at five a.m. and go downtown. But, considering how awful it is for me to get up at five a.m., I’m going to say he’s got the toughness and determination to keep my attention at least into the next page.

Genre? Mystery. The body’s a dead (excuse me) giveaway.

Do we need to know who the character is, how they got here, where they were before? I don’t. A mystery is about the crime. The detective is secondary. And so far, this mystery is starting out with a bang.

Do we need to know what happens next? I expect Ben to get some immediate, very pertinent clues. Most detectives at this stage examine the body.

Does this paragraph drop us right smack in a specific moment in this character’s story? Absolutely. First we’re with Ben being waken by police dispatch, by the end of the sentence we’re being spoken to in Ben’s face, and then we’re with the coroner’s assistant on a foggy city street. You bet.

So let’s talk about the structure of it. First: a warning. If this Marlowe is THE Marlowe, this book had better be as well-written as Chandler’s. Otherwise you have a lot of company. Lots and lots of aspiring mystery writers try to include Philip in their work—it’s flattering to Chandler, but I have never, ever read one that worked. Just like using another writer’s song lyrics, if you are piggybacking on the fame of someone else’s creation, your creation had better be able to stand up to the comparison, or you’re cheating.

Second: I mentioned an interesting issue with the drop-kick category. It’s this: your hook doesn’t have to be 150 words long. I think you already have your hook, and it’s that first paragraph. See the drop-kick? Not only is Marlowe dead, Marlowe’s body had been dumped unceremoniously in a filthy alley—even worse than dead!

Can this be made shorter and snappier? I’ll tell you, I’d remove one comma before the phrase “in Ben’s face” and you’ve got your hook in the first paragraph. Excellent job! The faster you get to the drop-kick, the more powerful the hook. Suck that reader in! This second paragraph is actually the beginning of the story.

Just so we know that’s the hook, I’ll go ahead and tighten the second paragraph. Mostly, I’ll drop the words “careless” and “lazy.”

This is one polished piece.

Copy & Line Edit

To begin with, Marlowe was dead. The police dispatcher said that over the phone, when he broke into Ben’s sleep at five a.m., and the coroner’s assistant said it again to Ben’s face. Marlowe had been dead at least seven hours, shot and dumped in a filthy alley.

The assistant was pear-shaped, dressed in a black suit, his short neck balancing a head that resembled a soft-boiled egg, gluey white and hairless. He stood beside a sleek dark van, meticulously placing thin metal instruments inside a black leather satchel. Two other vehicles—a brown sedan and a black and white police cruiser—stood at angles to the van, all headlights blazing. The three cars illuminated a small island in a sea of fog that filled the street. Red and yellow lights on the roof of the cruiser turned slowly, splashing the gray with murky color.