Tess

‘Escapism’ is one of the publishing industry’s favourite buzz words at the moment, and we’ve heard many literary agents using it when recounting their chats with publishers at the London Book Fair 2023. It seems a lot of commissioning editors, and therefore agents, are looking for novels that provide readers with an escape from ordinary life. But what is escapism in fiction and how do you write a novel that readers want to escape into?

At secondary school, teachers often encourage students to use a thesaurus to find more interesting options for their creative writing and expand their vocabulary. If you study the craft at university level, though, most tutors will tell you not to use one, to simply use the words that come naturally. Fiction should be true to the author’s voice, not striving for a preconceived – probably elitist – idea of good writing.

Many of our BPA First Novel Award and Pitch Prize judges say they’re looking for an attention-grabbing opening and a stand-out first line. The first line of your novel is undeniably important, but terms like ‘attention-grabbing’ can be easily misconstrued. That’s part of the reason we decided to start sharing our favourite opening lines from your entries on Twitter. Some of these sentences are subtle and some are bold. Some are simple and others are lyrical. Some are long, some short.