Since We're on the Subject

As NaNo is right around the corner, and as we've been discussing opening lines and scenes these past few posts (here and here), I thought that posting this from The Write Life seemed apropos.

The Worst Way to Begin Your Novel Advice from Literary Agents by Chuck Sambuchino gives some terrific bullet points for authors from the literary agent's point of view. Some of them are things most of us have seen and heard and dislike on our own.

“A sci-fi novel that spends the first two pages describing the strange landscape.”
- Chip MacGregor, MacGregor Literary

or

“A cheesy hook drives me nuts. They say ‘Open with a hook!’ to grab the reader. That’s true, but there’s a fine line between an intriguing hook and one that’s just silly. An example of a silly hook would be opening with a line of overtly sexual dialogue.”

- Daniel Lazar, Writers House

Both of these are terrific in my view but the one that stopped me cold came up regarding too much flowery prose, if only cause it intersected so well with my own series of posts on descriptions of mornings (here).

“The [adjective] [adjective] sun rose in the [adjective] [adjective] sky, shedding its [adjective] light across the [adjective] [adjective] [adjective] land.”
- Chip MacGregor, MacGregor Literary

It's so close to Roger Lawrence's comment on my post Doubter's Take Note:

It's because mornings are so much more vital. After you've said, "the evening sun cast an ochre smear over the dying sky", or something like that; what more is there to say.