# 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:** 119
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [February 7, 2023, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2370 "2023-02-07T23:39:30Z")
“Last night’s amateur astronomers got a treat in the form of clear skies, a new moon, and Comet Sakamoto.” _Wanderers_ by Chuck Wendig ---
**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:** [February 8, 2023, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2371 "2023-02-08T19:30:04Z")
“My uncle Herman once packed a year’s course on metaphysics into a single short sentence: ‘Everything that happens just happens because everything in the world just happened.’” _Fluke: The Math & Myth of Coincidence_, by Joseph Mazur ---
**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:** [February 10, 2023, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2372 "2023-02-10T21:45:02Z")
“Harriet Lee’s gingerbread is not comfort food.” _Gingerbread_ by Helen Oyeyemi ---
**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:** [February 12, 2023, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2373 "2023-02-12T22:20:45Z")
“Keokuk is a place name that elicits chuckles, like Peoria or Ketchikan.” _Introducing Elsa Maxwell: How an Irrepressible Nobody Conquered High Society, Hollywood, the Press, and the World_, by Sam Staggs. ---
**Author:** ![Amikejo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/amikejo/32/13637_2.png) [@Amikejo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amikejo)\ **Post date:** [February 12, 2023, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2374 "2023-02-12T22:24:38Z")
“If this discourse appears too long to be read at one sitting, it may be split into six parts”. - Discourse on Method and the Meditations, by Descartes. ---
**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:** [February 15, 2023, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2375 "2023-02-15T14:37:51Z")
“We need more peacocks!” _Round Up the Usual Peacocks_, by Donna Andrews. ---
**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:** [February 17, 2023, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2376 "2023-02-17T18:57:04Z")
“The road to the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, runs through a pocket square of a town tucked between two interstates in the northeastern United States.” _Norwich: One Tiny Vermont Town’s Secret to Happiness and Excellence_, by Karen Crouse. ---
**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:** [February 19, 2023, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2377 "2023-02-19T15:08:38Z")
“There is just one hymn left to practice.” Mad Blood Stirring, by Simon Mayo ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [February 19, 2023, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2378 "2023-02-19T21:42:34Z")
“This is the day the world changes” (_The Mirage_, by Matt Ruff) ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2023, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2379 "2023-02-20T01:43:11Z")
“We have to talk,” said Kate quietly, sitting almost unseen in the shadows under the awning which sheltered the Airstream caravan which had been Richard’s home for almost 5 years. (_Luna City 11th Inning Stretch_, by Celia Hayes & Jeanne Hayden) ---
**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:** [February 21, 2023, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2380 "2023-02-21T19:07:23Z")
“The future is a wild fantasy.” _The Skeptics’ Guide to the Future: What Yesterday’s Science and Science Fiction Tell Us About the World of Tomorrow_, by Steven Novella, with Bob Novella and Jay Novella. ---
**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:** [February 24, 2023, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2381 "2023-02-24T00:00:17Z")
“No one could say he hadn’t been warned.” _Sewer, Gas, & Electric_, by Matt Ruff ---
**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:** [February 26, 2023, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2382 "2023-02-26T22:41:02Z")
“Chad Hurley wanted to create _something_; he just wasn’t sure what.” _Like, Comment, Subscribe: Inside YouTube’s Chaotic Rise to World Domination_, by Mark Bergen ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2023, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2383 "2023-02-27T21:52:52Z")
“Hey.” “Hey.” _The Orville: Season 1.5: New Beginnings_ by David A. Goodman, David Cabeza and Michael Atiyeh “A great stone face stares silently from a South Dakota mountainside, unable to express the genius, warmth, and humor of the man it depicts.” _The Unexpected George Washington_ by Harlow Giles Unger ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2023, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2384 "2023-02-28T01:34:07Z")
“Night. District Three of the Ho Chi Minh Autonomous Trade Zone. The plastic awning of the cafe streamed with rain.” The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler ---
**Author:** ![fordgt100](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@fordgt100](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fordgt100)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2023, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2385 "2023-02-28T04:01:57Z")
“Francis Marion Tarwater’s uncle had been dead for only half a day when the boy got too drunk to finish digging his grave and a Negro named Buford Munson, who had come to get a jug filled, had to finish it and drag the body from the breakfast table where it was still sitting and bury it in a decent and Christian way, with the sign of its Savior at the head of the grave and enough dirt to keep the dogs from digging it up.” from “You Can’t Be Any Poorer Than Dead” by Flannery O’Connor. ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2023, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2386 "2023-02-28T16:06:40Z")
“In the summer of 2004, Hurricane Charley roared out of the Gulf of Mexico and swept across Florida to the Atlantic Ocean.” From “Justice: What’s the Right Thing to Do?” by Michael J. Sandel ---
**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:** [February 28, 2023, 9:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2387 "2023-02-28T21:31:00Z")
“Da! Da! Wake up!” _Flynn’s World_, by Gregory McDonald ---
**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:** [March 1, 2023, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2388 "2023-03-01T19:21:27Z")
The sun was falling toward the distant western end of the narrow land bridge – barely three miles wide in places – connecting the convoluted coastlines of Persia and Arabia. _Pass of Fire_ (Destroyermen #14), by Taylor Anderson ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2023, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/2389 "2023-03-01T23:34:46Z")
“The socialite was dragged into the street and attacked by a homicidal homeless man, until another man in a giant bunny costume came to her rescue.” _The Maltese Iguana_, Tim Dorsey [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858.md?page=118) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858.md?page=120)