Beginning, Middle, and End Blogfest

Meadows's fix for saggy middles: Blow it up!

Fellow writer-blogger Kate Larkindale is running a Beginning, Middle, and End blogfest. A pretty great idea, since beginnings get a lot of attention among writers in the blogosphere; endings a bit less -- and middles? Least of all. And we do know that middle-of-the-novel sag tends to be a major problem for some writers (not naming any names). See Jodi Meadows's middle-fix tricks here.

I'm not sure how much you can tell from single lines, but it would be cool if one's first, exact middle (check your page count, divide in half, put finger on midpoint), and last line could tell the whole story of a novel. Here's the trio from Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy:

First: Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun.


Middle: "Trillian," he said, "is this sort of thing going to happen every time we use the Improbability Drive?"


Last: "Okay, baby, hold tight," said Zaphod. "We'll take in a quick bite at the Restaurant at the End of the Universe."


Sweet! And by the way, I'm LMAO reading this Douglas Adams classic. Pick it up if you need a lift.


And here's a famous kidlit first line quiz that's kind of fun, as long as we're vaguely on the subject.