That’s the one I immediately thought of.
I’ve yet to read that one, but I readily concede. Methinks it’s time to hit Amazon. 
In the beginning… (someone had to) 
I was trapped in a house with a lawyer, a bare-breasted woman and a dead man. The rattlesnake in the paper bag only complicated matters. - Fat Tuesday by Earl Emerson
This is the story of Achilles’ rage. - The Iliad by Homer
“He was born with the gift of laughter, and a sense that the world was mad.”
- Scaramouche by Raphael Sabatini
“Scarlet O’Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when captured by her charms as were the Tarleton twins.”
That’s one of the first that comes to mind.
I also concur with the opening line to Rebecca.
Since all mine were mentioned, here’s one from an unlikely source:
“She shivers in the wind like the last leaf on a dying tree.”
From “The Customer is Always Right”, a Sin City short by Frank Miller. Also the first line of the movie.
And since HHGTG was already done, let’s not forget the opening line from The Restaurant at the End of the Universe:
"The story so far:
In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move."
Well, that one varies widely with translation. I think the most common variation is, “Rage! Sing it, Goddess, the rage of Achilles.”
Personally, my favorite has always been, “Sing, Goddess, of the rage of Achilles.”
“The world is what it is; men who are nothing, who allow themselves to become nothing, have no place in it.”
A Bend in the River, V.S. Naipaul
Drat. But Seriously I freaked when I read it. I was like SO THERE IS A BOOK THAT STARTS OUT WITH THAT!!!
The first that sprung to mind was this one:
"It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn’t know what I was doing in New York."
From The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plaith
" When a day that you happen to know is Wednesday starts off sounding like
Sunday, there is something seriously wrong somewhere. "
The Day Of The Triffids.
"The day I met George was the worst day of my life."
*Night Fall * by Joan Aiken.
In one of his books Max Shulman speaks about the importance of the opening line of a story, and he suggests:
“Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Four shots ripped through my groin, and I was off on the greatest adventure of my life! But first, let me tell you a little about myself.”
from Tripmaster Monkey: His Fake Book by Maxine Hong Kingston
This is the one I was going to say.
“Because I was the darkest of the children it was always understood that I would recieve the most education and would rise highest in the state.” The Day of the Drones by A. M. LIghtner
Oh yay, this one hasn’t been mentioned yet…
<gives me the chills just thinking about it>
As the corpse went past the flies left the restaurant table in a cloud and rushed after it, but they came back a few minutes later.
George Orwell, “Marrakech”
“One may as well begin with Helen’s letters to her sister.” – Howard’s End by E.M.Forster.
I love the way it implies that stories may start in many places.
“We were about to give up and call it a night when somebody dropped the girl off the bridge.” --Darker Than Amber by John D. MacDonald, my personal favorite of his Travis McGee series.
(The second line is: “They came to a yelping stop overhead, out of sight, dumped her over the bridge rail and took off.” Dare you to stop reading!)
OK, always read thread title before posting… FICTION!
Doh! :smack:
“When August came out on the porch, the blue pigs were eating a rattlesnake - not a very big one. It had probably just been crawling around looking for shade when it ran into the pigs. They were having a fine tug-of-war with it and its rattling days were over.”
Larry McMurtry, “Lonesome Dove”
If you haven’t read this book, do yourself a favor and read it during your summer vacation.