# 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:** 82
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2021, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1629 "2021-06-10T18:01:57Z")
Read _The Quest Of The Warrior Sheep_ by Christine and Christopher Russell to find out. ---
**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:** [June 10, 2021, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1630 "2021-06-10T22:47:24Z")
“Andreas Schleicher sat down quietly toward the back of the room, trying not to attract attention.” _The Smartest Kids in the World: and How They Got That Way_, by Amanda Ripley ---
**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:** [June 13, 2021, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1631 "2021-06-13T18:51:38Z")
“At Graduation, every five or seven or ten years, the Aristoi celebrated in Persepolis.” _Aristoi_, by Walter Jon Williams ---
**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:** [June 14, 2021, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1632 "2021-06-14T01:19:11Z")
> [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](#): > > Now _that’s_ an opening sentence… which could easily have been four or five! One of the shorter sentences in the book. ---
**Author:** ![Morgyn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morgyn/32/3041_2.png) [@Morgyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgyn)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2021, 2:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1633 "2021-06-14T02:51:39Z")
From the pleasantly situated old village of Mayenfeld, a footpath winds through green and shady fields to the foot of the mountains, which on this side look down from their stern and lofty heights upon the valley below. — _Heidi_, Johanna Spyri ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2021, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1634 "2021-06-15T08:11:38Z")
“In 1864, the Reverend J. P. Gulliver, of Norwich, Connecticut, recalled a conversation with Abraham Lincoln about how the president had acquired his famously persuasive rhetorical skill. The source, Lincoln said, was geometry.” _Shape,_ by Jordan Ellenberg ---
**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:** [June 16, 2021, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1635 "2021-06-16T14:31:31Z")
"From the top deck of the bus, Marty and I were mesmerized by Fifth Avenue as we watched glamorous stores spring up like pages out of _Mademoiselle_. _Summer at Tiffany_, by Marjorie Hart ---
**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:** [June 17, 2021, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1636 "2021-06-17T19:43:03Z")
“God was grumbling his thunder and playing the zig-zag lightning thru his fingers.” _Jonah’s Gourd Vine_, by Zora Neale Hurston ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stainless_steel_rat/32/5727_2.png) [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1637 "2021-06-18T01:31:25Z")
San Francisco Bay shimmered under a brilliant blue sky on the morning of May 15, 1917, yet Captain John Stanley Cameron was plagued by a sailor’s nagging superstition as he guided his three-masted barque, the _Beluga_, out through the heads and into the Pacific Ocean. _The Wolf_ by Richard Guilliatt and Peter Hohnen subtitle: (How one German raider terrorized the Allies in the most epic voyage of WWI) ---
**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:** [June 18, 2021, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1638 "2021-06-18T02:28:46Z")
My first introduction to ancient climate came in a freshman course on archaeology taught by a venerable lecturer who had last been in the field sometime before World War I and whose ideas had changed little since. _The Long Summer: How Climate Changed Civilization_, by Brian Fagan ---
**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:** [June 19, 2021, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1639 "2021-06-19T16:08:02Z")
“In his day, Antonio Lucio Vivaldi was known far and wide as ‘the Red Priest’ for his distinctive red hair and early training as a clergyman, but music lovers today know him best for the omnipresent strains of _The Four Seasons_ piped everywhere from elevators to movie theaters.” _Secret Lives of the Great Composers: What Your Teachers Never Told You About the World’s Musical Masters_", by Elizabeth Lunday ---
**Author:** ![Railer13](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/railer13/32/9742_2.png) [@Railer13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Railer13)\ **Post date:** [June 19, 2021, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1640 "2021-06-19T17:32:29Z")
“‘Madame Weel-cock?’ Her left eyelid wrenched open, and warm yellow light flooded into the crack.” _Who is Maud Dixon?_, by Alexandra 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:** [June 20, 2021, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1641 "2021-06-20T21:36:56Z")
“Do you really think there’s room for all this baggage on the boat?” _Terns of Endearment_, 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:** [June 23, 2021, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1642 "2021-06-23T23:25:05Z")
“Orthodox tradition and icons are inseparable from each other.” _Hidden and Triumphant: The Underground Struggle to Save Russian Iconography_, by Irina Yazykova ---
**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:** [June 24, 2021, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1643 "2021-06-24T00:52:17Z")
_“I wanted to drive the American roads at century’s end, to look at the country again, from border to border and beach to beach.”_ –Roads by Larry McMurtry ---
**Author:** ![The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_stainless_steel_rat/32/5727_2.png) [@The\_Stainless\_Steel\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Stainless_Steel_Rat)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2021, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1644 "2021-06-24T01:55:07Z")
_What’s two plus two?_ _ **Hail Mary** _ by Andy Weir ---
**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:** [June 25, 2021, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1645 "2021-06-25T13:49:12Z")
“Hayden Griffin was plucking a fish when the gravity bell rang.” _Sun of Suns_, by Karl Schroeder. ---
**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:** [June 27, 2021, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1646 "2021-06-27T15:40:09Z")
“We’ve been in the new apartment for a week.” _Strange Contagion: Inside the Surprising Science of Infectious Behaviors and Viral Emotions and What The Tell Us About Ourselves_ , by Lee Daniel Kravetz. ---
**Author:** ![FallingLeaves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/54ee81/32.png) [@FallingLeaves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FallingLeaves)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2021, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1647 "2021-06-27T16:44:05Z")
“There was every possibility that I was dead, and my brain hadn’t got the memo” _A Cast of Vultures_ by Judith Flanders ---
**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:** [June 28, 2021, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858/1648 "2021-06-28T23:22:22Z")
“As all our male voices have gone to war, the village choir is to close following Cmdr. Edmund Winthrop’s funeral next Tuesday.” _The Chilbury Ladies’ Choir_, by Jennifer Ryan [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858.md?page=81) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-first-sentence-from-the-book-you-are-currently-reading/784858.md?page=83)