Of editgasms and novel ideas

I threatened a friend on her blog to do an edit of the first two words of her first chapter (and the chapter title) as an editgasm; she asked to see it, the resulting was written up:

CHAPTER 1

I sometimes 

"CHAPTER 1"? Really? Firstly, the egregious use of capitals is designed to drag the reader in, and only serves the same purpose as multiple exclamation marks. Your story should be worthwhile on its own merits, and not need to shout for my approval and beg to be read like a little child waving around a picture and hoping it get posted on a fridge overflowing with crap art.

Secondly, 1. Words are written out in fiction. While it may seem that you are trying to make up for the abuse of CHAPTER (aka READ ME) with a quieter denouncement of the 1, all it does is pander to internet-speak. You may as well as call it CHAPTER LOL!!1! at this stage.

Regarding the start of your brief sentences (the word paragraph, obviously, cannot apply to such a meagre offering), you begin with "I". Who is this I? Does the back copy tell me? Why should I begin caring about him, or her, at all? To compound your sins, you continue with "sometimes". This is the start to a novel, not a short story. Be specific, focus, draw the reader into the narrative with certainty. An uncertain voice starting out that quickly merely serves to make the reader believe the author is uncertain as well and calls the entire narrative into question as the reader is forced to solidify every authorial vagueness in his or her own head, which is far too much work for a story that is, clearly, not literature, as it is being written for the YA market.

To sum up: I believe leaving CHAPTER 1 as it stands may actually suffice, as the readers expectations will be rendered sufficiently low as to make those first sentences, if not bearable, at least acceptable. I trust that you will understand my reluctance to parse your story further, as your use of 'relative' along would warrant a small essay on the misuse of the family dynamic to lull readers into a false sense of security, to say nothing of the insult it does to the field of psychiatry.

I wonder, now, if one could do an entire novel in this style. Write up a first chapter of something and then a whole novel critiquing it, the rants about various aspects of story and structure revealing the narrator more and more ... it might be a fun experiment for nanowrimo, come to think of it.