To prologue or not to prologue? That is the question. Does our story actually need one, or are we cool to just dive in? Great question. Prologues can be tricky. The problem with the prologue is it has kind of gotten a bad rap over the years with agents and editors. They generally hate them.

Why?

In my opinion, it is because far too many writers don’t use prologues properly and that, in itself, has created its own problem. Because of the steady misuse of prologues, many readers skip them.

Thus, the question of whether or not the prologue is even considered the beginning of your novel can become a gray area if readers just thumb pages until they see Chapter One.

***Critical point here. SOME GENRES use prologues as a staple and readers won’t skip them. This said, we still need to make sure we understand the purpose of a prologue so we’re using this literary device the way it was intended. And if we aren’t, well…

We gotta know the rules to break the rules and all that jazz 😉 .

So without further ado…