The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.
--William Gibson (Neuromancer, 1984)
There is a real art to the opening lines of books. The first few sentences have a big job: setting the scene, introducing the characters and hooking the reader. The example above is one that I come back to time and time again and still love. It is very poetic, the way that just this one sentence can begin to paint a picture of a dismal, rainy place is very impressive. Some opening lines become so famous that they are remembered long after the rest of the book has been forgotten. Here are a few of my favourites, most of them are very well known so I have left off the author and book, feel free to take a guess at them or to share your own favourite opening lines:
1. It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.
2. We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold.
3. If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.
4. I am a sick man... I am a spiteful man. I am an unpleasant man. I think my liver is diseased.
5. A squat grey building of only thirty-four storeys. Over the main entrance the words "Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre" and, in a shield, the World State's Motto: "Community, Identity, Stability".
6. All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. (I have never actually read this book, but the opening line is famous enough that it springs straight to mind)
7. Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small, unregarded yellow sun.
Each of these openings serves its purpose beautifully, and each time I see one of them I'm hooked enough to continue reading.
--William Gibson (Neuromancer, 1984)
There is a real art to the opening lines of books. The first few sentences have a big job: setting the scene, introducing the characters and hooking the reader. The example above is one that I come back to time and time again and still love. It is very poetic, the way that just this one sentence can begin to paint a picture of a dismal, rainy place is very impressive. Some opening lines become so famous that they are remembered long after the rest of the book has been forgotten. Here are a few of my favourites, most of them are very well known so I have left off the author and book, feel free to take a guess at them or to share your own favourite opening lines:
1. It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.
2. We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold.
3. If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.
4. I am a sick man... I am a spiteful man. I am an unpleasant man. I think my liver is diseased.
5. A squat grey building of only thirty-four storeys. Over the main entrance the words "Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre" and, in a shield, the World State's Motto: "Community, Identity, Stability".
6. All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. (I have never actually read this book, but the opening line is famous enough that it springs straight to mind)
7. Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the western spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small, unregarded yellow sun.
Each of these openings serves its purpose beautifully, and each time I see one of them I'm hooked enough to continue reading.
