I recently had a whole chapter which opened a lot of questions. At least that's the effect I hope I created. It featured around two characters, and while the chapter made it obvious something had recently happened, it said nothing about what that something was only that it was very dark and terrible. It also made the relationship between the two characters very confusing. The way they speak to each other, it's almost as if they've hated each other before. My idea was, basically, to create all these questions in the opening chapter and make readers want to carry on reading in order to discover the answers which are gradually revealed. I hope it worked as a good hook.
I agree. Their ideas need to run on almost immediately.
The only problem with that is if you switch scenes, or viewpoint characters, with a view to returning to your cliffhanger later. You'd need to have the reader prepared for that by earlier switches, and possibly fairly short chapters.
It is a device, but I don't think there's anything wrong with it used in moderation. Just about every blockbuster film, TV series and even action-adventure novel use chapter/scene-end hooks all the time.
My favourite hook is "Mark materialised roughly ten feet above the ground."
I recently had a whole chapter which opened a lot of questions. At least that's the effect I hope I created. It featured around two characters, and while the chapter made it obvious something had recently happened, it said nothing about what that something was only that it was very dark and terrible. It also made the relationship between the two characters very confusing. The way they speak to each other, it's almost as if they've hated each other before. My idea was, basically, to create all these questions in the opening chapter and make readers want to carry on reading in order to discover the answers which are gradually revealed. I hope it worked as a good hook.
I agree. Their ideas need to run on almost immediately.
The only problem with that is if you switch scenes, or viewpoint characters, with a view to returning to your cliffhanger later. You'd need to have the reader prepared for that by earlier switches, and possibly fairly short chapters.
It is a device, but I don't think there's anything wrong with it used in moderation. Just about every blockbuster film, TV series and even action-adventure novel use chapter/scene-end hooks all the time.
Sauce for the goose :)