The First Five Pages: A Writer’s Guide to Staying Out of the Rejection Pile tries to be exactly what its title says. This isn’t a book for writers looking to take their craft to the next level, it’s a checklist of bad habits that will cause editors to dismiss your writing at first glance. The entire premise of the book is that editors are looking for a reason to reject your manuscript. Knowing what they are looking for helps you to avoid giving them that reason. It doesn’t claim that your writing will be accepted if you follow its advice, but simply that avoiding these mistakes will at least force the editor to give your work more than a cursory glance.

Does it work? Meh. It’s a quick read, so it doesn’t hurt, but after that I think it probably has more value as a reference/checklist that a writer might skim through on occasion to make sure he isn’t falling into bad habits.

Each chapter is centered around a particular bad habit that the author maintains an editor will notice very quickly and use as an excuse for rejection. They are ordered in decreasing importance (to an editor) and so, the most egregious errors are in the first few chapters. It’s a good premise. My problem with it was that there wasn’t much in here that any writer with a modicum of experience wouldn’t already know. It might be valuable as a checklist for the experienced writer, but it won’t add much to their knowledge.

My biggest complaint with the book is the examples. Without exception, the examples (of bad habits) are such over-the-top bad writing that it’s hard to think anything other that ‘who writes like this?’ There’s not much in the way of subtle nuance which makes it difficult to draw parallels from the examples to your own writing.

If you want a quick read and perhaps a little insight into the mind of an editor, give it a look. If you’re looking to improve your writing, there are better books to be found.

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