A great hook isn’t your opener. It’s your engine. It’s the tension that pulls a reader through 80,000 words with a white-knuckled “but what happens next?”
You know your story has potential: good characters, a compelling world, tension-filled stakes. But when you pitch it—“A museum curator discovers dragons are real,” or “A cybersecurity expert’s daughter gets blackmailed online”—it falls flat. You've got all these lovely gems, but they haven't been cut to sparkle.
That’s where the What If Ladder comes in. It’s a simple but ruthless tool that turns floaty concepts into hooks with teeth. Teeth that prove your story can power a whole book and explain why it’s worth reading.
You need a hook that does two things: it convinces you the story can go the distance—preferably before you're knee-deep in revision despair—and it shows other people why it matters. The What If Ladder helps by targeting the usual failures: ideas so broad they lose meaning, stakes with no urgency, problems that vanish with better planning, and concepts that feel like a series of cool events instead of one relentless thread of tension.
This method doesn’t just sidestep those issues. It goes for their throat. In four steps, you’ll go from “vague idea” to “Oh. That’s a book.”
Make it work for you
The What If Ladder has four rungs—each one adding tension, focus, and emotional punch. Climb them to turn loose story elements into a hook with weight.
Rung 1: Start with your premise (the basic "what if")
Start with the spark. You want the world, the moment, and the weird little idea that made your brain go wait… what if? That’s your foundation. But it’s not a hook yet.
Ask yourself: What's the core situation or world element that makes this story the most interesting?
Rung 2: Add the character, with specificity
Cool concepts don’t hook readers. People do. Attach the premise to a specific kind of person, not just a name or job title, but a real flavor of human whose life would be wrecked or at least changed drastically by this setup.
Ask yourself: What kind of person would be most affected—emotionally, morally, professionally—if this premise became their reality?
Rung 3: Layer in stakes
If the plot goes sideways, what does it cost this character? Not in theory—in their life. What could they lose, miss, ruin, or destroy? The more concrete and specific the fallout, the sharper your hook gets.
Ask yourself: What does this character stand to lose that no one else would lose in quite the same way?
Rung 4: Make sure it's personal
Even life-or-death can feel low-stakes if your character could just… decide to move to Reno instead. Readers want to see a fight that feels inevitable and is deeply personal to the character. Focus on creating an internal collision—two values, two loyalties, two drives. No easy out.
Ask yourself: What choice would force your character to give up something they care about… to protect something else they care about even more?
This is how you write a story hook.
It’s also how you turn a book into a barnacle—one that latches onto a reader’s brain and rides along for years, tucked under the surface of their happy whale-song life.
And it’s how you give your story the leg-day strength to stand up on its own and march you through the writing process—no saggy middle, no flagging enthusiasm, just forward motion.
I hope I’ve mixed enough metaphors to send you off confident, and only slightly dizzy. Have fun!
Examples
❌ Rung 1, Basic Premise:
What if dragons exist in the modern world?
Why it's stuck: Could be any story about any character. No forward momentum or specific conflict.
❌ Rung 2, Character Specificity:
What if a museum curator discovers dragons exist in the modern world?
Why it's still stuck: Better, but still no personal stakes or compelling reason this matters to this curator specifically.
✅ Rung 3, Personal Stakes:
What if a museum curator who’s spent her career protecting historical artifacts discovers that dragons are real—and they want their stolen treasures returned?
Why it works better: Now we have personal stakes—her life's work is threatened, and there's a clear conflict brewing.
✅ Full ladder - Rung 4, Make It Personal:
What if a museum curator who's built her entire identity around preserving history discovers that dragons are real, they want their stolen artifacts back, and returning them means admitting her career has been built on glorified theft?
What changed: Added the personal struggle—an identity crisis that forces her to choose between her professional reputation and doing what's morally right. Now the external conflict (dragons want their stuff) creates internal tension that can drive a full book.
❌ Rung 1, Basic Premise:
What if someone's teenager gets in trouble online?
Why it's stuck: Too generic—could be any parent, any trouble, any outcome. No specific forward momentum.
❌ Rung 2, Character Specificity:
What if a cybersecurity expert's teenage daughter gets blackmailed online?
Why it's still stuck: Better character fit, but still no reason this matters uniquely to this character or why she can't just call the police.
✅ Rung 3, Personal Stakes:
What if a cybersecurity expert who values privacy above all else discovers her teenage daughter is being blackmailed online, and conventional help would expose her daughter's secrets to authorities?
Why it works better: The stakes become a personal struggle when she has to choose between her core professional principles and protecting her child.
✅ Full ladder - Rung 4, Make It Personal:
What if a cybersecurity expert who values privacy above all else discovers her teenage daughter is being blackmailed online, and the only way to save her is to hack into systems using the invasive techniques she's spent years fighting against?
What changed: Personal stakes become a personal struggle by forcing her to choose between her core professional principles and protecting her child. She can't solve this with better technology or resources—only by betraying everything she stands for.
❌ Rung 1, Basic Premise:
What if someone has to choose between family and love?
Why it's stuck: Generic conflict that could apply to any character in any time period. No specific stakes or circumstances.
❌ Rung 2, Character Specificity:
What if a 1920s jazz singer has to choose between her imprisoned brother and her respectable fiancé?
Why it's still stuck: Better setting and character, but still unclear why this is an either/or choice or what's actually at stake.
✅ Rung 3, Personal Stakes:
What if a 1920s jazz singer who's built her career on her "respectable" image discovers evidence that could exonerate her wrongly imprisoned brother, but presenting it would expose her secret nightclub performances?
Why it works better: Now there are real stakes—helping her brother threatens the respectable reputation she's carefully constructed.
✅ Full ladder - Rung 4, Make It Personal:
What if a 1920s jazz singer who’s built her career on a “respectable” image discovers evidence that could free her imprisoned brother—but revealing it would expose her secret nightclub gigs and destroy both her reputation and her future with the respectable fiancé she’s come to love?
What changed:
The personal struggle now pits her loyalty to her brother against the love and respectability she’s built her life around. It’s not just high stakes—it’s personal, and there’s no way through without risking something that matters deeply.