Cliffhangers!
When I'm writing a story, I try to include cliffhangers at the end of my chapters.
In the first book of my trilogy, Where the Stars Grant Wishes, I end my first chapter this way. . .
My clammy fingers fidgeted with the embroidered hanky Ma had given me earlier for something new and something blue. I gasped. What were my borrowed and old items? Had Ma forgotten? I couldn't get married without them. Restless, my feet stirred beneath my skirt. Should I turn and run or stay?
Does it make you want to read the next chapter to see if she gets cold feet on her wedding day?
Book two, Mama's Memories, is a little different than the first. I reminiscence in it. Or should I say, Lucy (my main character) reminiscences.
I wasn't sure if it was gonna work or not, buy everyone who has read it says the book is not confusing at all the way I wrote it.
Lucy is pregnant with her 8th child in this book, which takes place in 1924, and she is close to her delivery date. At different times she thinks back to events that has happened in her life since the ending of the first book (Where the Stars Grant Wishes) in 1910.
I end the chapters before she reminiscences with phrases like this.....
"I try to block the memory out of my mind," I said. "We can't go back and change what happened. But I still remember every detail of what took place as if it were yesterday . . .
This is the end of Chapter 1, and hopefully it makes the reader want to read chapter 2 where she reminiscences about the time she overdoses her first baby with laudanum.
In 1918 the war raged overseas, countries competed with each other for power, and there was so much killing but not in the holler. In the holler I was giving birth to a set of twins . . .
This is the end of chapter 11 where she leads up to chapter 12 and reminiscences about the birth of her twins, when all along she thought she was only carrying one baby!
And at the end of the book, I, hopefully, make you want to read the third book of my trilogy (which I am currently writing) by saying . . .
It was time now for my youngins to start their lives and make their own memories and mistakes. I just hoped Jonathan and I had brought them up well and their good memories would outweigh their mistakes and their wishes on stars would always come true.
Only time would tell . . .
If you haven't read them yet, I hope you consider reading them and write a review. They are also both available on kindle unlimited. Click on the pics below to go to their Amazon page.
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