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Over-explanation. This includes prologues. “Prologues are never needed. You can usually throw them in the garbage. They’re usually put on as a patch.”

Too much data. “You’re trying to seduce your reader, not burden them,” Friedman said.

Over-writing, or “trying too hard.” “We think the more description we add, the more vivid it will be; but we don’t want to be distracted from the story” we open the book for.

Beginning the novel with an interior monologue or reflection. Usually this is written as the thoughts of a character who is sitting alone, musing and thinking back on a story. Just start with the story.

Beginning the novel with a flashback. Friedman isn’t entirely anti-flashback, but the novel’s opening page is the wrong place for one.

Beginning a novel with the “waking up sequence” of a character waking, getting out of bed, putting on slippers, heading for the kitchen and coffee…a cliche

Related cliche: beginning the novel with an alarm clock or a ringing phone

Starting out with an “ordinary day’s routine” for the main character

Beginning with “crisis moments” that aren’t unique: “When the doctor said ‘malignant,’ my life changed forever…” or “The day my father left us I was seven years old…”

Don’t start with a dialogue that doesn’t have any context. Building characterization through dialogue is okay anywhere else but there.

Starting with backstory, or “going back, then going forward.”

Info dump. More formally called “exposition.”

You used one hand to keep your book open as the other one traced in circles and various other shapes along my ankle. Your copy of Ludlum’s “The Matlock Paper” held you in a steady concentration that I always somehow admired.

I loved these evenings where we both read our favourite books in bed, on the bed and even around the bed. Our clothes were scattered, the sheets were a mess and the pillows weren’t anywhere near our heads. Everything seemed out of order, but the moment you’d turn your head and look up at me, everything fell into place. The sparkle in your eyes almost always shot this burst of excitement through my body and that cute little smile you’d put up just made it inevitable, I had to smile. You made smiling so easy, so wonderful.

Usually this moment meant that you had read enough and wanted to redirect your attention and concentration elsewhere. And I’m thrilled to say that pretty much every time, it was to me. You’d roll around and sit up and within no time, your hands would move their way up along my sides before I’d feel your arms around me, tugging me closer to you. Your warmth breath near my lips made me shiver, you always liked making me await that kiss. “The longer you wait, the better it is”, you had always told me and not so surprisingly, it always was. I felt the slight touch of a finger trailing upwards along my spine and at the same time, your lips met mine. And the moment I felt your hands releasing me slightly and making their way down along my sides, I always told myself that I really liked these book evenings.