# Favorite First Lines **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [October 7, 2008, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882 "2008-10-07T18:48:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![MsWhatsit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/eb8c5e/32.png) [@MsWhatsit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsWhatsit)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/21 "2008-10-07T23:25:11Z")
The Deliverator belongs to an elite order, a hallow subcategory. – Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson. ---
**Author:** ![Foolonthehill](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e274bd/32.png) [@Foolonthehill](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Foolonthehill)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/22 "2008-10-07T23:39:42Z")
“Picture a summer stolen whole from some coming-of-age film set in the 1950s.” In The Woods, (2007), by Tana French. ---
**Author:** ![Cunctator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/43a26b/32.png) [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/23 "2008-10-07T23:50:23Z")
“Call me Ishmael”, from Moby-Dick “In the beginning was the Word” from the English version of St John’s Gospel ---
**Author:** ![Palo\_Verde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/65b543/32.png) [@Palo\_Verde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Palo_Verde)\ **Post date:** [October 7, 2008, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/24 "2008-10-07T23:59:19Z")
Gone with the Wind “Scarlet O’Hara was not beautiful.” ---
**Author:** ![rolandgunslinger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/cdc98d/32.png) [@rolandgunslinger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rolandgunslinger)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/25 "2008-10-08T00:00:50Z")
> [@Rebo](#): > > “The dark man fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.” > > Swallowed me right up, it did. That. ---
**Author:** ![koeeoaddi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/koeeoaddi/32/408_2.png) [@koeeoaddi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/koeeoaddi)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/26 "2008-10-08T00:25:40Z")
“On the third day of their honeymoon, infamous environmental activist Stewie Woods and his new bride, Annabel Bellotti, were spiking trees in the forest when a cow exploded and blew them up. Until then, their marriage had been happy.” – Open Season, by C.J. Box ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/27 "2008-10-08T00:34:16Z")
“You see, I had this space suit.” - Have Space Suit Will Travel, Robert Heinlein ---
**Author:** ![PharmBoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/74df32/32.png) [@PharmBoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PharmBoy)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/28 "2008-10-08T01:28:59Z")
> [@Mahna\_Mahna](#): > > I think it’s hard to top the first sentence in _The Thought Gang_ by Tibor Fischer. > > (the rest of the book is equally awesome, BTW) I think I can do without such “Awesomeness”":dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Geobabe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/geobabe/32/3908_2.png) [@Geobabe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Geobabe)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/29 "2008-10-08T01:54:14Z")
“The citadel was dark, and the heroes were sleeping. When they breathed, it sounded as if they were testing the air for dragon smoke.” _Jitterbug Perfume_, Tom Robbins ---
**Author:** ![Cub\_Mistress](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea666f/32.png) [@Cub\_Mistress](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cub_Mistress)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/30 "2008-10-08T01:58:45Z")
“In my family, there was no clear division between religion and fly fishing.” ~by Norman Maclean, A River Runs Through It, 1976~ ---
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/31 "2008-10-08T02:11:17Z")
“He was born with the gift of laughter, and a sense that the world was mad.” - _Scaramouche_ by Rafael Sabatini. ---
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/32 "2008-10-08T02:42:16Z")
“It was the best of times, it was the **blurst** of times” Damn it! ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 3:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/33 "2008-10-08T03:02:27Z")
> [@Anaamika](#): > > “Last night I dreamt I went to Manderlay again.” –\*Rebecca \* ---
**Author:** ![Mahna\_Mahna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e47c2d/32.png) [@Mahna\_Mahna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mahna_Mahna)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/34 "2008-10-08T03:19:28Z")
> [@PharmBoy](#): > > I think I can do without such “Awesomeness”":dubious: To each their own. I assume you’re not much for Tom Robbins either, in that case (given that the two authors have a similar way with words). ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 3:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/35 "2008-10-08T03:33:09Z")
From Day Trips to the Desert , by Geoff Nicholson: > [@](#): > > It was a Sunday evening in May 1991 and I was sitting in Room 206 of the Desert Villa Hotel in Barstow, on the edge of the Mojave Desert, drinking tequila and Minute Maid orange soda; the nearest I could get to a tequila sunrise. ---
**Author:** ![A\_shameful\_cracka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ebca7d/32.png) [@A\_shameful\_cracka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A_shameful_cracka)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/36 "2008-10-08T03:40:26Z")
“In five years, the penis will be obsolete,” said the salesman. ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 8:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/37 "2008-10-08T08:37:26Z")
Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Arm of the Great Spiral Galaxy lies a small, unregarded yellow sun. -_Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy_, Douglas Adams ---
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 8:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/38 "2008-10-08T08:56:59Z")
“Marley was dead, to begin with.” ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 11:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/39 "2008-10-08T11:06:13Z")
"It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me.” ---
**Author:** ![Eutychus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Eutychus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eutychus)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2008, 11:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/favorite-first-lines/466882/40 "2008-10-08T11:24:08Z")
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