I’ve always been a fan of a good prologue, especially for fantasy stories. They set the stage for the magical world you are about to enter. A good prologue is layered with foreshadowing, telling the reader enough to grab their attention but not enough to give away the plot of the story (or series).
When I outlined Tales & Treasure, I included a prologue. I wanted to set the scene for my world, introduce a pivotal character, and show some magic because the fantastical elements take a while to appear in the novel.
I liked how the prologue turned out. It was concise yet detailed enough to draw the reader in, and I wanted to keep it. But in an effort to reduce the word count, I had to cut everything that was unessential, and unfortunately, the prologue fell into that category.
However, the beauty of this Substack is that I don’t need to worry about word count, and I can tell the story that I want to tell. So here is the first deleted scene. Let me know if you think it should be in the final draft whenever I get around to self-publishing.
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