Week 25: The introduction that wrote itself

It’s week twenty-five of 2026. How’s the writing going these days? Here in San Francisco, I’m glorying in our nearly 15 hours of daylight—even if some (okay, many) of those hours are chilly and foggy.

I need all of the energy and brain power those daylight hours give me as I’m deep in my last major revision round for Novel Study Book 2, following the excellent advice of my beta readers. A huge thank you to Nicole, Annmarie, Lori, Jamie, Devora, and Anne for the feedback that will make this a much better book than it would have been otherwise.

Some of the feedback has been small and easy to implement, like Anne’s smart suggestion to add a mini table of contents at the beginning of each part, so readers will know whether a particular case study is the right one for them to read next.

Other pieces of advice have taken more time. When I read Lori’s observation that the current introduction opens with a declaration of what the book isn’t going to do, rather than a more positive framing of what it is going to do, I knew immediately that she was right to suggest a change. But I didn’t know right away what I wanted to lead with instead. The opening paragraphs of any book—fiction or nonfiction—are the most important and, as many of you know, often the hardest to write.

I had some writing time blocked off Thursday morning and planned to tackle the new introduction then, but I showed up to my desk distracted and tired—and with only an hour to write before I had to go collect my car from the mechanic. I almost decided to abandon the writing session and get a head start on the day’s editing work. But I reminded myself how committed I am to this book (and just how much work it still needs before my deadline) and decided I would at least give it a shot.

I opened my Word doc, shoved the old opening paragraphs out of the way with a few taps of the enter key, sat there for a moment—and then a whole new introduction came flying out of my fingers. Some part of my brain had been working away at the problem without my realizing it, and the new idea and the words for it were right there as soon as I gave them a reason to come out.

These are the magical moments we live for as writers. Those twenty minutes of writing, and my sense of satisfaction about the sparkling new intro, have fueled me all week, through more of the grueling or boring hours of revision work. I hope you get to experience one of these sessions soon too.

I was on the Indy Author podcast this past week, talking to Matty Dalrymple about how to use interiority, which might be one of the most valuable tools a fiction writer has. Just a few topics we cover:

Plus, in the intro, hear my answer to Matty’s request to tell listeners one thing they might not know about me ⚾

I chose Freida McFadden’s The Intruder for Novel Study because her books are bestsellers among bestsellers. In 2025, she had three of the twenty bestselling books in the US and sold more than six million print copies (Publishers Weekly). What’s the secret to her success with readers? Are there craft tools she’s using that you could apply to your own work? Some of the key attributes of her books—like her surprise twists—will not work for every story or every author. Other techniques, like her rhythm of opening and closing story questions and the way she strategically positions cliff-hangers, are more widely applicable.

Let’s start by looking at my intensity graphs for the book, which give a good snapshot of what it feels like to read a McFadden novel.

We get a couple of sharp jolts at the beginning to hook us: layered over the baseline suspense about a coming storm, McFadden deploys the hook of the titular intruder. Casey sees a face outside the window of her remote cabin in chapter 3, then discovers a girl in her shed brandishing a knife in chapter 11. The overall intensity of the action dips slightly through the middle as we spend more time in the “Before” strand we think belongs to the girl in the shed, but we still get regular spikes of higher intensity material, and then in the final stretch, nine of the last twenty-three chapters are at the maximum external intensity level, in which the stakes are life and death. In many of those chapters, the internal intensity is just as high.

Read the rest!

This is the last of my pieces on The Intruder, but the Novel Study Book Club will be back in early 2027—stay tuned for more information this fall. I’ve pulled together all three of my craft essays on The Intruder, my chapter-by-chapter reading notes, and 5 charts into a free PDF. You can check it out at the link below.

If you know a writer or editor who’d enjoy it, please pass along the link!

The Newcomers arrive on the Isle of Touperdu.

It is 1880, and immigrants are flocking to a new refuge from the economic and racial turmoil of the late nineteenth century. For New Orleans chef Amadeo Roselyn, the Isle of Touperdu is where he can open his own restaurant and raise his daughters as educated, marriageable ladies in a place free of the violence roiling the post-Reconstruction-era South. For Gwennoelle Duday, the matriarch of a rackety family of witches from the French village of Fourche, it is where the Dudays can act freely, unfettered by other people of “talent” and any foolish talk of rules and higher law.

But the night before they disembark, a question troubles both Amadeo in first class and Madame Duday in steerage. It is one that will haunt them for years after they step onto the island—is the promise of Touperdu a lie?

The Newcomers is the first novel in a series set on the fictional island of Touperdu, where the lines blur between superstition and magic, legend and history, promises and betrayal. Two immigrant families confront the question all outsiders face when they enter a new world: What can you do—and what will you give up—to truly belong?

Congrats, Pam! Learn more and buy the book here.

I love speaking to writers and editors—check out my Speaking page or reply to this email if you are interested in having me speak to your group.

Our Thing of Joy this week: Video of a raucous, joyful bike ride through the streets of Portland by a bunch of my fellow GenX menopausal women, organized by Menopunks, creators of a podcast and soon-to-be documentary feature that captures a lot of my own rage and joy and resignation (Instagram).

Stay well, y’all, and keep fighting the good fights.

Kristen