Hello everyone,

Beginners are constantly told first lines are very important, however, browsing in the bookshop lately, I’ve noticed the first lines of many published novels, (especially new writers) don’t ‘grab’ the reader.

I've come to the conclusion, first lines are only important to initially ‘grab’ the agent or editor, so they will read the whole page or more.

Would do you think?

Dawn,

I don't ignore submissions that have a good as opposed to a 'grabbing' opening line, but I must admit that as a reader I love to be grabbed, as it were.

I've recently been sent a script that opens with the line

"Of course the cow would fit in the speedboat"

I don't know about you, but I really wanted to know what the hell was going on.

Philip Pullman's opening three words

Lyra and her daemon...

immediately had me hooked (and within the first page I was wishing madly for a daemon of my own)

The there are the classics like Pride and Prejudice and Rebecca whose opeing lines are probably known by more people that those who have actually read the books.

As I said, I don't demand a brilliant opening line, and I've loved lots of books that have fairly mundane or ordinary beginnings. But there's never any harm in snagging a reader early on.

Katie

<Added>

Sorry, rushing again - in the penultimate paragraph it should read 'then' and 'opening'. But you probably knew that...

I agree, I like to be grabbed (by the first line of course).

Was it Mickey Spillane who said, “the first line sells the book, and the last line, sells the next one,” something like that.

I saw a tv programme on Philip Pullman, he doesn’t plan his books he just writes and it all works out, I find that amazing, I suppose it depends on what you are writing, and your experience.

Ah well, never mind.
Dawn,

I went to a platform talk Pullman gave at the National and he said he was having huge problems with the opening of 'Northern Lights' until those words occurred to him. Suddenly the concept of a daemon solved his narrative problem and gave Lyra someone to talk to.

Made me think of Tolkein, and the famous story of how he was marking exam papers in his study when he doodled on one student's page

In a hole in the ground lived a Hobbit

Funny how one random idea can spark off a whole new direction in your writing; and make for a very good beginning.

Best first line I heard lost my attention in the next line

THe boys turned up early to the hanging...


but I also like this one

FOR a big man he had remarkably small toes

I love first lines and I had two great first lines in both my novels. Unfortunately I had to move one to halfway through the book and another until after the Prologue so that didn't work too well!

The opening line has to raise questions in the readers’ minds. So it can be weird, like the one Katie quoted, or it can be intriguing – like the random generated one that so many people have responded to (that was brilliant, by the way).

As she opened the car door she changed her mind isn’t out of the ordinary but it raises so many questions you have to read a bit further to find out why. I used the same idea in the novel I’m trying to sell at the moment. The first line is:

The sun came out, unexpectedly lifting Hugh’s spirits as he slipped his Mercedes onto the M6, northbound.

One person told me I’d put the comma in the wrong place so I had to explain that it was the lifting of Hugh’s spirits that was unexpected, not the sun coming out… Durrr!
But, otherwise, it seems to work. The ms has come second in one competition, highly commended in another and got me an agent.

So an opening line doesn’t need to be completely off the wall but, if it is, there’d better be some substance to it or the reader will feel cheated and probably won’t buy your second great work…

Cheers
Dee


<Added>

I should have said the first comma...

I liked that Dee. I liked first lines that open possibilities and ask lots of questions. I particularly like this one

I had been making the rounds of the Sacrifice Poles the day we heard my brother had escaped. I already knew something was going to happen; the Factory told me

OKAY so two lines but brother escaped?!?!? Sacrifice Poles? Factory!?!?!?

This is one of my favs:-

'Frederick J Frenger. Jr. a blithe psychopath from California, asked the flight attendant in first class for another glass of champagne and some writing materials.'
(Miami Blues, Charles Willeford).

I just had to buy it, and wasn't disappointed.

I love this book I also love Freddy he is so bad he’s great.

Dee - I like your first line, makes me want to read on, why Northbound? comes to mind.

James - who is the big man with the small toes, sounds interesting.


Dawn,

Favourite first lines:-

"Tyler gets me a job as a waiter, after that Tyler's pushing a gun in my mouth and saying, the first step to eternal life is you have to die."
-Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk

"Whosoever knows the folds and complexities of his own mother's body, he shall never die."
-Purple America, Rick Moody

"Who was blowing on the nape of my neck?"
-Ghostwritten, David Mitchell
*All the more fantastic as the book in one huge circle starts and ends on the same line.

I absolutely love first lines that not only grab you, but punch you in the stomach and then kick you in the balls when you're down!

I spent ages on the first line for Feeling Gravitys

"When your life is in danger, at that point when you truly believe you are going to die, you can be forgiven for thinking that life is not, has not, treated you particularly kindly."

The first line for my latest effort, Smoke is

"One million people are going to die tonight and there's nothing you or I can do about it."

And no it doesn't involve killer plagues, weapons of mass destruction of any other doomsday device!

Geoff

I like those first lines Geoff.

BIg guy with small toes is from a story of mine. I know this character, I know the story, I know the first line. Just can't write it at the moment. But it is something to do with snail shells!

One of my first lines was

When I came to, I realised that the past and the future were equally vast and that this was the centre.

At 99% completion I realised that it couldn't be a first line so now it just starts off a section. Unfortunate, but better for the novel as a whole.

My other one is ok, but not a classic.

It fell into place like a full stop; the end of one and the beginning of the other. Thwack…

That was after my original first line gave too much away. It was possible to guess the ending of the novel too early with my previous one so went for something more neutral and ambigious... COUntered it a bit by putting in a noirish prologue but a clever first line always makes you feel good.

KEep looking at yours DEe. Something a little bit scary and chilling there. Especially the with the comma before Northbound. A resolution from your character? A decision? Where's he going? IS he evil? LIke that loads

Some brilliant quotes here.
Anthony, I love the one about the big guy with small toes, and Dee, the whole comma, northbound thing had me intrigued.

Personally, if the first few lines of one of my stories doesn't inspire me to immediately re-think the original idea and jot down a thirty minute tangential story then I quickly give up.

I'm never sure what the reader's ofmy stories might think of the first few lines, but unless they grab me, the stories don;t get written.

Geoff,

love that line:

"One million people are going to die tonight and there's nothing you or I can do about it."

It reminds of something similar, probably from a film, I jsut can't remember which one. An absolute cracker of a line, very Alistair Maclean, it might be from his film adaptation of The Satan Bug, I think there's a similar line in the script that had me on the edge oy my seat.

Great stuff, and that's a first line that will make readers want to read more! Brilliant.

Steven

And don't forget the first line that (almost) everyone knows... 'Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again'- even if they haven't read the book. (Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier.) And this struck me, from the title story in the collection 'Why Don't You Stop Talking?' by Jackie Kay- 'I saw her looking at me filling my trolley with chocloate biscuits.'

One of my favourite first lines, and one that made me stop and think before even considering the second sentence come from Kurt Vonnegaut's (Sp?) Slaughterhouse 5

'Billy Pilgrim is a Spastic in time.'

I'm pretty sure the book ends with

'Poo-to-wheet.'

Or something similar, and what's more, the damn thing all makes sense. LOL

Darryl