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As a fantasy editor, I am no stranger to prologues. My authors love them. However, I rarely see prologues done well on the first try. After all, there’s an art to them that many authors don’t understand. A good prologue can enhance the reading experience, but a bad prologue can lose readers before they’ve even reached chapter one.

To Prologue or Not to Prologue

Before including them, authors should decide if their prologues are truly necessary. After all, there are readers out there that skip pre-story altogether. As such, if the information in the prologue is essential to understanding the story, it’s better to just start with chapter 1. Alternatively, if the prologue covers segments of heavy backstory, authors should opt to weave the backstory throughout the rest of the book.

Authors should think of prologues as their own mini-stories. They should be able to stand on their own, and the rest of the story should make sense if the prologue is skipped. So, a hook in a prologue won’t necessarily function as the hook for the entire book. Chapter one still needs its own hook for those pesky readers who have sworn off reading prologues.

What Makes a Good Prologue?

Because readers skip prologues so often, they shouldn’t be pivotal to the understanding of the story. That being said, the people who read the prologue should have an enhanced experience. Good prologues intrigue the audience and pull them fully into the story world. They get readers invested and make them want to keep reading.

Bad Prologues

The worst thing authors can do with their prologues is to make them purely backstory. Those are the types of prologues they better hope their audiences skip. Without a hook, readers will not care about the story. Unfortunately, when readers don’t care, they stop reading.

Contrary to popular belief, a prologue is not an excuse to dump a pile of backstory onto the page. Backstory has to be earned. If it comes too early in the story, before readers care, it tends to bore people half to death. So, instead of writing what’s essentially a history book excerpt, authors should strive to bury their backstory in a scene or place it elsewhere in the book.

The Publishing Industry

Because some readers decide to skip prologues, many publishers and editors see them as a waste of time. In fact, some publishers reject books strictly because they have prologues. Alternatively, they may instruct their authors to remove prologues before publication.

At Best Edition Editing, though, I never outright tell my authors to delete prologues just because some readers don’t like them. If done well, prologues can be little treats for the people who bother to read them. The only downside is the cost of the extra ink and paper.

The Argument

Sometimes, when authors learn that certain readers skip prologues, they grow immediately defensive. They think, “Well, I don’t want those readers!” Although that may be true, these writers should reconsider their stance. Authors, especially those who are self-published or just starting out, benefit from every reader who makes it past chapter one. Their purchases are still money in the bank.