First Lines
I love exploring how writers set the tone
When I first read Paul Combs’ stories with novel recommendations based on the first lines of books, I was up in the middle of the night reading. I was inspired and ran to my bookshelf, grabbed a stack, and returned to my computer to launch in.
I love this kind of thing. Those who have edited me know that I tend to use a lot of quotes and passages in my writing about writing. I’ve had some limits placed on me as to exactly how much of this I can get away with (“Maybe you could say something about the quote?”)
Fair enough, but I still see the passages themselves as treasures worthy of being pulled out and savored on their own. So this was the perfect exercise for me.
I have now gathered a total of thirty (and there will be more because this is really fun), but I will follow the tradition set by Combs and limit myself to fifteen per story.
For these fifteen, I divided them into four general categories: short (no more than one line of text); longer, but not revealing much about the book itself; and longer ones that DO clue you in on what is to come (sometimes dramatically). And those somewhere in the middle. Here they are:
