Podcasts › Fiction Writing Made Easy with Savannah Gilbo
#263. How Emily Henry Hooks Readers in Chapter One of Book Lovers
What's in this episode
Your first chapter needs to hook the reader—but that doesn’t mean you need a huge plot twist, dramatic action, or a flashy meet-cute on page one. The first chapter of Emily Henry’s Book Lovers is mostly two sisters walking through New York and talking. There’s plenty of banter, interiority, description, and backstory—but the big plot development doesn’t arrive until fairly late in the chapter. So how does Emily Henry make an opening chapter like this feel so engaging and full of momentum—and what can writers learn from the scene structure underneath it? That’s what we’re going to look at in this episode. In the episode, you’ll hear us talk about things like: [05:05] How many scenes actually exist within this first chapter (the answer might surprise you!)—and what the structure looks like once we break it down [06:55] How EmHen wrote an engaging opening chapter where two sisters are walking and talking (and why this is such a great example of a ‘quiet’ scene goal that still generates forward momentum) [08:10] What makes the protagonist’s sister, Libby, the scene antagonist—even though she isn’t a “bad” character and has good intentions [09:50] How the conflict escalates on both an e