Very good advice, Martha. Thanks. I think a lot of this is helpful to us non-fiction writers, too.
Martha, how can I disagree? I think your discussion of opening lines is dead on. I spend considerable time thinking about them, and the first couple of paragraphs of my novels go through many, many, many revisions.
I'll offer another opening line for your collection. While not "great," perhaps it has promise. It's the opener to a story blog I've just started--I'm very much in First Draft Land there, pulling myself up by the bootstraps. I've started with a concept and am going to see where it goes. . .online.
Anyway, the opening line is:
Just after dark, death grabbed me by the ass.
Thus begins a tale told by Patch in "Death Sucks: On being a vampire kitty-kat." With luck, the line smacks of voice and raises a story question or two. If you're interested, go to www.vampirekittycat.com.
Again, terrific post. As I read I wished I'd thought to say those things.
Best,
Ray Rhamey
Flogging the Quill
Death Sucks
Martha -
As always entertaining even for the non-literary writer. I offer two other first lines, one philosophical, one decidedly not.
"All men by nature stretch-out towards knowledge." - Aristotle, Metaphysics
"At an age when most young Scotsmen were lifting skirts, plowing furrows and spreading seed, Mungo Park was displaying his bare buttocks to al-haj’ Ali Ibn Fatoudi, Emir of Ludamar." - T.C. Boyle, Water Music
I'm told T.C. Boyle is "a boy's writer", so perhaps it is unsurprising that this line caught my attention when first I read it.
Well, anyone is more than welcome to come over to The Bookseller to the Stars and rate my opening...
In "The Bookseller to the Stars" novel, my first line is...
“Why are you taking the ‘Da Vinci Code’ out of the window display?” Lisa asks me.
It's pretty much downhill from there. Kidding.
Working on the beginning has been the hardest for me. How do you present yourself without boring the pants off someone. I have come up with more beginnings than anything else. Great advice as always honey. Cheers
I always learn so much from reading your blog, Martha.
This is a wonderful and inspiring (okay, intimidating) post. Thanks, Martha!
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