When you write a nonfiction book, which chapter should you start with? The first? The last? The introduction? What’s most efficient? What’s easiest? What will make the writing sing?

In my experience, it’s usually best to write a book starting with the first chapter and write sequentially to the last. You can then most easily build each chapter on the previous. You leave the introduction for writing last.

Why the introduction last? Because only at the end can you completely figure out what your book is about. You may think you have your message nailed when you start, but only when you finish do you realize your initial effort went a bit awry.

In my book Stairway to Earth, I began by thinking I was writing about how to write a book. That sounded pretty straightforward! But only as I wrote did I realize I wasn’t being specific enough. I was not writing about writing. I was writing about process, about managing creative steps—prewriting, research, drafting, revising.

So when I realized this, I rewrote the introduction outline and drafted it with the benefit of a message developed by writing all the other chapters first.

Other writers take varying approaches. Len Deighton, the British writer famous for his military histories and novels, suggests writing chapters when the material is fresh. “A surprising interview of revealing research,” he says, “may lead you to write the fifth chapter first.” See his column for more tips.

When it comes to narrative nonfiction—or nonfiction “stories”—Pulitzer Prize winner Jon Franklin always urged writers to start near the end. In his Writing for Story, he maintained that the place to start is at the climax. From there, you write through to the closing page—and only then go to the beginning.

Franklin’s reason for starting at the end is simple, if counterintuitive. Once you write the end, you can write the beginning with the knowledge of where you’re going. You don’t gnaw with uncertainty of your destination. You know what to put in for background and what to foreshadow. And you don’t write as much stuff that you’ll have to throw away as irrelevant later.

So before you write your chapters, by all means flesh out your overall outline. But when you sit down to choose where to start drafting, consider the alternatives for sequencing the work. Write in the order that makes your work most efficient and effective.

[Revised January 2020. Originally published May 23, 2011]