Should i read the introduction

One of the best things about graduating with my BA in English was that I no longer had to read the introductions in books. With syllabi aplenty in college, our reading calendars were filled out specifically to include the Roman numeral—bearing sections of the texts we read.

I started slogging through the introductions before reading whatever book we studied: Middlemarch , Villette , Frankenstein , and others and, frankly, any other number of books by white women. So goes academia. The drawback of reading introductions—besides frequently being bored by them—was that the plots were often spoiled.

Naturally, much of the literary analysis or criticism that happens in an introduction relies on the central events of the novel. Bear with this part, as the section after explains how to write a great Introduction. Foreword: appropriate for any nonfiction book, but not required Written by someone other than the author, someone with renown, whose words lend credibility to the author and to the book.

At the end of the Foreword, the name of the person who wrote it appears, along with the date and location. Introduction: appropriate for self-help books and most nonfiction books written for a general audience Written by the author.

Introduces the subject matter. Explains how the author came to write the book. Explains why a person should read the book or the problem the book will solve.

Includes advice on how to read the book optional. Preface: appropriate for memoirs and for academic or technical books Written by the author.

Tells how the book came to be written and why the author is qualified to write on the subject. Avoid including too much content in your Introduction—leave the important material for your chapters, and keep the Introduction short, usually between fifteen-hundred and two-thousand words much shorter than that if your other chapters are short. The introduction is where you want to explain what your book is about by touching on the major themes.

What are your readers going to get out of reading your book? Here is where you make your case. Having the necessary information in place and named correctly can benefit your book a great deal. Would you like to discuss any of these manuscript elements with the editors at Greenleaf Book Group? Do you need help deciding if you should include any of these elements in your manuscript? The introduction is definitely the best part to get your reader hooked and wanting to keep reading and get super interested in what you got to say.

Implementing these little techniques can really make a big difference. Though I am not out to write a book introduction in the near future, it is interesting to learn the tips you have given here. Having a structure to work is so helpful. Since it is a simple 3 step structure, it can be easily committed to memory. You have given great examples here that clarify the point very effectively.

Not only does the article give great tips it made a very interesting read. This is a good tutorial on writing introductions. My question is that all of this also applies equally to the concept of writing a good first chapter.

Is there anything that you would do differently in an introduction as opposed to a first chapter? Some books eschew an introduction and kick straight into Chapter 1 — in which case the structure above would need to be executed in Chapter 1. Skip to primary navigation Skip to content Skip to primary sidebar. It might be a short ebook you intend to give away to blog subscribers.

Or you might be trying to pen a New York Times bestseller. Either way, I think I know which bit of your book is causing you problems. The introduction. The good news is, it only takes three steps to knock down that wall. What is the purpose of the introduction? What to put in an introduction?