Rating: 
Summary: Great for beginners
Review: Noah Lukeman writes as though he's 100 years old, so finding out he's actually quite young gave me a shock. The tone in this book reminds me of a finger-wagging, stern English teacher.On the other hand, if you read each chapter carefully and do exactly as he says, your writing will definitely get better. No question. The small flaws that clutter the first few pages can ruin a book over its length. Usually they point to someone who isn't good enough at their craft, hence the name of the book. Removing them will do your writing a lot of good, however finicky they may seem at first. Experienced writers will gain little from reading this, though. Instead, I'd recommend Noah Lukeman's second book, The Plot Thickens.
Rating: 
Summary: Whatever You Do, Don't Reject This Book
Review: Noah Lukeman's book on staying out of the rejection pile is different from most in that it's written by an agent and not a teacher. That makes a huge difference. Lukeman is telling us what he sees on a daily basis and how to elevate your work from the bottom of the slush pile. The book does a great job of explaining the problems most manuscripts contain, then tells you how to fix them, THEN offers exercises to help you overcome the problem. After working through just one exercise, I felt like my writing took a major leap forward. I think the book will do the same for all serious writers willing to devote a little time to this valuable book. 206 pages
Rating: 
Summary: Stop reading after Chapter 6
Review: Noah Lukeman's book starts out strong with a new slant on much of the writing advice already out there: less is more, and most is even less than that. The exercises in the adjective and adverbs chapter are so helpful that they completely transformed the first chapter of my manuscript. Thanks, Mr. Lukeman. However, once beyond his excellent treatments on modifiers, sound, comparison, and style, one becomes acutely aware that like writing, editing is a highly subjective field. Many of the techniques that he advocates for sentence construction and dialogue directly contradicts the advice of other well-credentialed editors. This is where a strong sense of the strengths of your own writing, the conventions of your genre, and the preferences of your agent or editor is going to help you, and where "The First Five Pages" will fall short. Rather than strictly being a "how not to get rejected off the bat" guide as the cover blurb claims, "The First Five Pages" also endeavors to show you how to write the best novel you can. That's fine. But if you take Lukeman too seriously, you might come to the conclusion that he would rather you not write at all than have a single word out of place. It comes as no surprise, them, that towards the end of the book (and prominent on his literary agency's webpage), we find Lukeman's particular bias: "Ovid, the Roman poet, said one should wait nine years after finishing one's work before seeking publication. Here lies the difference between someone writing for money and a writer." If it's your goal to win a Pulitzer Prize, that's an admirable sentiment. For the rest of us making our livings as writers, who want to write great stories that make people think or feel, you are well advised to pick and choose from Lukeman's advice. If you can only buy one book on writing, I instead recommend Donald Maass's excellent book "How to Write the Breakout Novel" which not only focuses on good writing, but the themes and techniques which can make a novel a best-seller. Additionally, "Self-Editing for Fiction Writers" by Renni Browne and Dave King gives some excellent tips, though they disagree with Lukeman on some key points. My best advice is to read as many of these books as you can: take to heart those points on which everyone agrees, internalize the rest, and just write.
Rating:
Summary: If you're a writer, buy this book...!
Review: As a writer with a marketing background, the first aspect of this book that came to my attention was its title. Simplistic and to the point, the pages inside are even better. Because "The First Five Pages" doesn't tell you how to write a book, but what design elements will make it sell... As a successful literary agent, Noah Lukeman is more than qualified to address the subject of salable manuscripts, and "The First Five Pages" should be required reading for every writer, both hobbyist and New York Times best-seller alike. Lukeman's approach is far different from other books in the category because he never tells his reader how to write a great book, or even a good book. Rather, his purpose is to provide a roadmap for "staying out the rejection pile". And by following his guidelines for avoiding the "slush pile", writers will find that, as a result, their work improves. Although much of what the book reveals can be found in other books, "The First Five Pages" puts important concepts into easy-to-read language. And it hammers those concepts into your mind over and over again. Lukeman explores the use of adjectives and adverbs, unnecessary words, commonplace dialogue, and the ever important "showing versus telling". The book is broken down into nineteen chapters, each of which addresses a fundamental characteristic of the type of manuscript he, as an agent, is looking for. Moreover, his emphasis on "the first five pages" drives home the concept that every word must be precise, in its proper place, and every sentence should be the best it can be. If a reader isn't engaged by the fifth page, it doesn't matter how great the rest of your book is. You must hook the reader, and keep them hooked, which means crafting each word so as to create the best possible manuscript. It's this insight into the selection process of prospective agents that gives "The First Five Pages" its true value. If Lukeman uses certain criteria to make a summary judgement of a manuscript, you can bet his peers do as well. This book will help you figure out what those guidelines are, and how to adjust your manuscript with an eye toward impressing those agents. I've read this book several times, and I recommend it to others. This is a book all writers should buy and reread every few months. It may seem elementary at first, but even Michael Jordan practices free-throws... Writers also need to brush up on their fundamentals. Britt Gillette
Author of "Conquest of Paradise: An End-Times Nano-Thriller"
Rating:
Summary: An interesting and helpful book
Review: I found this book interesting -- it shows exactly how one literary agent goes about the process of evaluating manuscripts. The most common errors were sort of startling: overuse of adjectives and adverbs, failure to describe the setting (or submitting a "novel" which is almost entirely dialogue.) I tried some of his exercises and found them thought-provoking. The main point I took away from this book is that writing a good novel is a huge job. You can probably finish a novel in a year or so, but Margaret Mitchell took ten years to produce "Gone With The Wind." One of Lukeman's exercises is to take a four-hour work period and devote it to one paragraph. (!) This is a thought-provoking book, from its first sentence, which wonders out loud if the art of writing can really be taught. Lukeman doubts it, but he is sure that, like any English teacher worth his salt, he can teach people to stop making errors. An interesting side-point made here is the same point made by James Michener in his memoirs: there's no reliable money in this fiction-writing game. Novelists receive advances in the range of $3,000 to $25,000 for a novel, and only sometimes do their royalities earn that advance. Since it takes at least a year to write a novel, most novelists are apparently working for less than the minimum wage. So you'd better have some other motivation than money driving you. :-) Hmm.. I wonder how long it took Flaubert to write "Madame Bovary." Worth looking into!
Rating:
Summary: Just another writing book, but a good one
Review: After reading Immediate Fiction by Jerry Cleaver, I admit my expectations were very high for Lukeman's book, especially in light of the excellent reviews it got here. I was somewhat disappointed. While The First Five Pages does a great job of outlining common mistakes in writing (generally speaking, not just in the opening pages), it falls short in the How Do I Fix It department. Yes, it discusses the Dos vs. the Don'ts but it left me unsure how I go about recognizing the problems in my own work or the process of how to fix them. Just showing examples doesn't work for me. I need a process: here's what you look for, here's what you do when you find it. That's what I found in Cleaver's book, but I did not find it here. If you learn well from examples of Dos and Don'ts, this book might be very helpful. If you want to learn a process, go with Jerry Cleaver.
Rating:
Summary: Big Help
Review: As an aspiring writer, I took a writing course and read many books about writing. Noah Lukeman's The First Five Pages tackles problems not evident and gives solutions. I found it a big help, although some of the bad exemples are too simplistic. It is difficult to believe that any aspiring writer would write so badly. Analyzed exemples from great writers make a bigger impact on "how to". I would like to see more of those as corrective solutions.
Rating:
Summary: A useful perspective
Review: I've struggled a long time with my writing, mostly because while I knew my storytelling techniques were working just fine, something in my prose was holding me back. I found the answers I was looking for in Lukeman's FIRST FIVE PAGES. I also know as both a college English composition teacher and a reviewer, how awful so many writers are. Before my father died, he and I worked on some of his writing. I saw almost every error Lukemen talked about made in my father's works. Truthfully, if my dad's novels were typical of what crosses an agent's desk, then I can't say I'm surprised by the amount of rejection slips sent out. I've worked with students who think their work is perfect as is, and I end up being the one who disabuses them of that notion. I wouldn't want to be the agent who has to disabuse many writers of their ability level. But the most useful thing about THE FIRST FIVE PAGES is that it makes an excellent revision guide. He's not talking about the creation end of things. He's giving a checklist of things to review before sending out the novel. I learned a lot from this book, and I'm busily incorporating that knowledge into my writing. The only reason this book doesn't get five stars from me is the examples. Most of the examples he uses speak to the bottom end of unpublished writers, not the middle or top end, and as such, are less useful for good writers to find the subtle errors that keep them from the great level. Also, the published authors he does quote are not modern writers, and the styles have shifted enough to make what he use long out of date. But he does know what he's talking about as an agent. I'd recommend listening.
Rating:
Summary: Powerful Tool
Review: After years of writing quarterly reports for the Board of Directors I can look at an eight page report of numbers and tell instantly there's a typo on page six. It make perfect sense that editors can do the same with a manuscript. It is more than helpful to look at my writing with my editor's eye plugged in.
Madelyn West
Rating:
Summary: The Writers Bible
Review: Any writer who is trying to make it as a PUBLISHED writer, should do themselves the service of reading what this man has to say. Insightful, practical tips to polish your manuscripts into publishable form. Laid out nicely, and sequentially based upon his perception of the importance of each topic. There are things in this book that I would have learned only after years of rejection slips--or worse, never. Buy this book twice. Keep one in your bedroom, and one in your office.
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