Critique Your Opening Paragraph Like An Agent Would

Agents reportedly decide within a paragraph, sometimes a sentence, whether to keep reading. You have no way to test that except sending your manuscript into the void and waiting months. This gives you a blunt read right now, plus one fix for the biggest problem.

Read the opening paragraph of my manuscript below and critique it the way a literary agent scanning a slush pile would: with limited patience and a habit of stopping at the first weak sentence. Tell me honestly whether it would make you keep reading, and specifically why or why not. Point out any of the following if present: a slow or generic opening line, unclear point of view, exposition dumped too early, or a hook that is stated rather than shown. Do not soften the critique or pad it with compliments before the criticism. End with one rewritten version of the opening line that fixes the biggest problem you found. Paragraph: {OPENING_PARAGRAPH}