# What is the first sentence from the book you are currently reading? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** books-writing-myths\ **Created:** [April 20, 2017, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858 "2017-04-20T16:51:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [September 16, 2017, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/201 "2017-09-16T16:08:33Z")
“On May 18, 1860, the day when the Republican Party would nominate its candidate for president, Abraham Lincoln was up early.” – _Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln_, by Doris Kearns Goodwin ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2017, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/202 "2017-09-18T12:18:41Z")
> [@Tinker\_Grey](#): > > ‘What’s it going to be then, eh?’ Horrorshow! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Tinker\_Grey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tinker_grey/32/8136_2.png) [@Tinker\_Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tinker_Grey)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2017, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/203 "2017-09-19T01:51:03Z")
> [@Dung\_Beetle](#): > > Horrorshow! 🙂 Welly, welly, welly, welly, welly, welly, well. (Movie) 🆒 ---
**Author:** ![DZedNConfused](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dzednconfused/32/15991_2.png) [@DZedNConfused](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DZedNConfused)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2017, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/204 "2017-09-19T02:07:34Z")
Want to hear a ghost story? That’s good. I know a few. ---
**Author:** ![Blisters](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Blisters](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blisters)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2017, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/205 "2017-09-20T07:15:46Z")
“This is a cookbook for dolls. It is written for kind climates and summertime.” I know. It’s the first two. ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2017, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/206 "2017-09-20T15:02:34Z")
“When I was nine years old, I hid under a table and heard my sister kill a king.” _Quest for a Maid_, by Frances Mary Hendry ---
**Author:** ![Gordon\_Urquhart](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/db5fbb/32.png) [@Gordon\_Urquhart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gordon_Urquhart)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2017, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/207 "2017-09-20T17:12:06Z")
“Halfway down a bystreet of one of our New England towns stands a rusty wooden house, with seven acutely peaked gables, facing towards various points of the compass, and a huge, clustered chimney in the midst.” (_The House of the Seven Gables_, Nathaniel Hawthorne) “When Lady Ann Sercomb married George Smiley towards the end of the war she described him to her astonished Mayfair friends as breathtakingly ordinary.” (_Call for the Dead_, John le Carré) "August 1933, a summer’s day in Manhattan’s Lower East Side.” (from the introduction to _Ghostland_, Colin Dickey) ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2017, 5:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/208 "2017-09-20T17:29:04Z")
“Captain, Mister Grafton is attempting to put a man ashore, sir.” _Fragment_, by Warren Fahy. ---
**Author:** ![Greathouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/greathouse/32/2992_2.png) [@Greathouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Greathouse)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2017, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/209 "2017-09-20T17:45:59Z")
The gunslinger came awake from a confused dream which seemed to consist of a single image: that of the Sailor in the Tarot deck from which the man in black had dealt (or purported to deal) the gunslinger’s own moaning future. ---
**Author:** ![Bayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bayaker/32/3454_2.png) [@Bayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bayaker)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2017, 6:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/210 "2017-09-20T18:10:24Z")
“I remember how good the weather was that September.” from _The One From the Other_ by Philip Kerr “When, on Christmas Day, AD 800, Pope Leo III lowered the imperial crown on to the head of Charles, son of Pepin the Frank, and prostrated himself before him as Emperor of Rome, the Empire of Byzantium had been in existence for 470 years.” from _Byzantium (vol. II) - The Apogee_ by John Julius Norwich (With sentences like that it’s no wonder he filled three volumes) “On May 25th Arthur Surbonadier, whose real name was Arthur Simes, went to visit his uncle, Jacob Saint, whose real name was Jacob Simes.” from _Enter A Murderer_ by Ngaio Marsh ---
**Author:** ![Weisshund](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ba8739/32.png) [@Weisshund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weisshund)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2017, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/211 "2017-09-20T19:29:36Z")
“_i am sam. I am sam. Sam i am_.” ---
**Author:** ![stillownedbysetters](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/41988e/32.png) [@stillownedbysetters](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/stillownedbysetters)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2017, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/212 "2017-09-20T20:46:36Z")
“My dear friend Roz Horowitz met her new husband online dating, and Roz is three years older and 50 pounds heavier than I am, and people have said that is generally not as well-preserved, and so I thought I would try it even though I avoid going online too much.” **Young Jane Young** by Gabrielle Zevin ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2017, 5:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/213 "2017-09-22T17:39:25Z")
“This book begins with a plane crash.” **Beauty Queens** , by Libba Bray. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2017, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/214 "2017-09-22T21:44:13Z")
“Before she became the Girl From Nowhere – the One Who Walked In, the First and Last and Only, who lived a thousand years – she was just a little girl in Iowa, named Amy.” – **The Passage** , Justin Cronin (If you’ve read all three, should I get the other two books in the trilogy? I’m enjoying this one so far but haven’t gotten that far into it.) ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2017, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/215 "2017-09-28T22:07:48Z")
“You’re walking home late one night when two men leap out of the shadows, pull a hood over your head, and shove you into a van.” **Troubleshooting Your Novel: Essential Techniques for Identifying and Solving Manuscript Problems** , by Steven James. ---
**Author:** ![SCAdian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scadian/32/3292_2.png) [@SCAdian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SCAdian)\ **Post date:** [September 28, 2017, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/216 "2017-09-28T23:26:57Z")
“Wow, you could kill someone with that thing!” _Gone Gull_, the latest Meg Langslow mystery by Donna Andrews. “All right, let’s put our backs to it,” said Stephen Hamilton, as the barge carrying the rest of the escapees from the Tower of London began to pull away downriver, Harry Lefferts waving over the tern. _1635: A Parcel of Rogues_, by Eric Flint and Andrew Dennis. Many years ago I was expounding at length on some topic to my young son, who sat patiently for a while and then said, “Yes, dad, but how does it connect?” _By Steppe, Desert, and Ocean: The Birth of Eurasia_, by Barry Cunliffe. ---
**Author:** ![Sicks\_Ate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/258eb7/32.png) [@Sicks\_Ate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sicks_Ate)\ **Post date:** [September 29, 2017, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/217 "2017-09-29T02:43:59Z")
“When my mother was pregnant with me, she told me later, a party of hooded Ku Klux Klan riders galloped up to our home in Omaha, Nebraska, one night.” There Autobiography of Malcom X, as told to Alex Haley ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2017, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/218 "2017-10-02T13:56:52Z")
“Send up another, damn you, send them all up, at once if you have to!” _Empire of Ivory_, by Naomi Novik (Actually, that’s the first spoken sentence; the rest goes on for several more lines." ---
**Author:** ![Guest-starring\_Id](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guest-starring_id/32/21736_2.png) [@Guest-starring\_Id](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guest-starring_Id)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2017, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/219 "2017-10-02T14:04:29Z")
“They’re out there.” ---
**Author:** ![Dendarii\_Dame](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bbce88/32.png) [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2017, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/220 "2017-10-03T17:13:55Z")
“Turf history is emblazoned with the great names that have adorned it–Man o’ War, Colin, Sysonby, Exterminator, Count Fleet–but a little applause should be reserved for those not so richly endowed by nature who yet performed splendidly.” _A Touch of Greatness_, by C. W. Anderson. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858.md?page=12)