# What is the first sentence from the book you are currently reading?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858
**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:** 177
### Author:  [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)
#### Post date: [November 26, 2025, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3531 "2025-11-26T01:15:00Z")
“I stopped in front of a shop with a small wooden sign which hung from a wrought-iron spear projecting from the weathered stone wall.”
_Worlds of the Imperium_ by Keith Laumer
“Usain Bolt is the best human sprinter there has ever been.”
_Mathletics: A Scientist Explains 100 Amazing Things About the World of Sports_, by John D. Barrow
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### Author:  [@SCAdian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SCAdian)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2025, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3532 "2025-11-29T01:42:03Z")
“There will be bodies. It is only fair to warn you”, my husband told his workmen.
_There Will Be Bodies_, the 13th Flavia Albia mystery by Lindsey Davis
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### Author:  [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2025, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3533 "2025-11-29T03:39:39Z")
“Matthew Kappler is my brother-in-law, and we’re very different, and one of the biggest differences between us is that if I lived like him I would die.”
_It’s Only Drowning_ by David Litt
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### Author:  [@bmasters1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bmasters1)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2025, 9:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3534 "2025-11-29T09:10:50Z")
“When I was a kid, I had no great awareness of firemen.”
Dennis Smith, in _Firefighters_ from 1988 (a, so far from what I’ve read of it, very intriguing and interesting look at what it means to be that kind of American hero)
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### Author:  [@romansperson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/romansperson)
#### Post date: [November 29, 2025, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3535 "2025-11-29T17:44:36Z")
“But who?” said Lyra. “Who is waiting?”
_The Rose Field_ by Philip Pullman
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### Author:  [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2025, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3536 "2025-11-30T21:13:00Z")
“It was a quiet Sunday afternoon, with a brisk spring breeze ruffling the air off Narragansett Bay.”
_Expect Great things! How the Katharine Gibbs School Revolutionized the American Workplace for Women_, by Vanda Krefft
“This stupid peace and quiet is killing me!”
_Rockin’ Around the Chickadee_, by Donna Andrews.
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### Author:  [@Shot\_Clock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shot_Clock)
#### Post date: [November 30, 2025, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3537 "2025-11-30T21:39:49Z")
“A man stands on a windswept island, staring up at the sky.”
_October_ by China Mieville
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### Author:  [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)
#### Post date: [December 2, 2025, 8:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3538 "2025-12-02T08:36:22Z")
“The rue du Coq D’or, Paris, seven in the morning.”
– _Down and Out in Paris and London_, by George Orwell
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### Author:  [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2025, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3539 "2025-12-05T21:04:43Z")
“We’ve got movie sign!”
_Mystery Science Theater 3000: A Cultural History_, by Matt Foy and Christopher J. Olson
“Outside the picture window of the cafe’, snow drifted to the sidewalk in big fluffy flakes.”
_Love You a Latke_, by Amanda Elliot
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### Author:  [@teelabrown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/teelabrown)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2025, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3540 "2025-12-05T21:20:51Z")
“What’s two plus two?”
_Project Hail Mary_, by Andy Weir
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### Author:  [@SCAdian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SCAdian)
#### Post date: [December 5, 2025, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3541 "2025-12-05T22:22:59Z")
The theatre critic Friedrich Luft experienced the end of the war in a basement.
_Aftermath: Life in the Fallout of the Third Reich, 1945-1955_, by Harald Jähner
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### Author:  [@SCAdian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SCAdian)
#### Post date: [December 8, 2025, 3:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3542 "2025-12-08T15:47:01Z")
A few summers ago I visited two dairy farms, Huls Farm and Gardar Farm, which despite being located thousands of miles apart were still remarkably similar in their strengths and vulnerabilities.
_Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed_, by Jared Diamond
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### Author:  [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2025, 12:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3543 "2025-12-09T00:25:08Z")
“One afternoon in March of 1855, in his college office, whose austerity reflected his own lack of pretense and an honesty bordering, at times, on the severe, C. Thomas Ridgeley, the Dean of Men, considered the request of the stocky, auburn-haired sophomore who stood formally at attention, as was required of a student appearing before an officer of the college.”
_A Different Kind of Christmas_, by Alex Haley
“When I was an undergraduate, a story went around among students at my college that a fellow called Harris had refused to teach translation classes on the grounds that he did not know what ‘translation’ was.”
_Is That a Fish in Your Ear? Translation and the Meaning of Everything_, by David Bellos
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### Author:  [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2025, 3:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3544 "2025-12-09T03:40:56Z")
“This is the first volume of my collected short stories.”
– _Collected Short Stories, Volume 1_, by W. Somerset Maugham
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### Author:  [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat)
#### Post date: [December 9, 2025, 8:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3545 "2025-12-09T20:42:45Z")
A jerk, and a sudden rumbling vibration jolted Culihan O’Rourke When out of the pain-laced fog enfolding him.
_None But Man_ by Gordon R. Dickson
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### Author:  [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)
#### Post date: [December 12, 2025, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3546 "2025-12-12T20:43:10Z")
“More and more people each year are going abroad for Christmas.”
_A Highland Christmas_, by M. C. Beaton
" ‘You’re getting to be such a pro with those chopsticks,’ my grandmother said."
_Let It Glow_, by Marissa Meyer and Joanne Levy
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### Author:  [@Rhiannon8404](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhiannon8404)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2025, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3547 "2025-12-15T02:40:31Z")
“It’s funny, Vasher thought, how many things begin with my getting thrown into prison”
_Warbreaker_ by Brandon Sanderson
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### Author:  [@MacDoc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MacDoc)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2025, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3548 "2025-12-15T02:48:08Z")
I sorta think the first paragraph might entice people to find out more.
> AMUR TIGERS, popularly called Siberian tigers, are paradoxes of grace and violence.
vs
> AMUR TIGERS, popularly called Siberian tigers, are paradoxes of grace and violence. These lithe, elegant creatures regard their surroundings with the dispassionate air of royalty. They are also predators, evolved to slip unnoticed across the landscape; to insert themselves like puzzle pieces among rises, rocks, shadows, and trees; to position themselves as close as possible to a grazing deer or a resting boar before showing a burst of speed and force to incapacitate their target. Tigers rely on discretion for survival, which means that these cats of the north are almost impossible to see, much less study.
**Tigers Between Empires**
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### Author:  [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2025, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3549 "2025-12-15T04:19:05Z")
“The intense interest aroused in the public by what was known at the time as ‘The Styles Case’ has now somewhat subsided.”
— _The Mysterious Affair at Styles_, by Agatha Christie.
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### Author:  [@Dendarii\_Dame](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dendarii_Dame)
#### Post date: [December 15, 2025, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/3550 "2025-12-15T20:40:46Z")
“What Are the Top 10 Most Coveted Trophies in Sports?”
_Got Your Answers: The 100 Greatest Sports Arguments–Settled_, by Mike Greenberg with Paul “Hembo” Hembekides
“More years ago than I care to reckon up, I met Richard Feynman.”
_The Language God Talks: On Science and Religion_, by Herman Wouk
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