Yet another "Guess the book from the opening line"

[Bobotheoptimist]

“The rain made everything sound different – the engine of my delivery van, the traffic as it rolled by on a film of fallen clouds, the occasional dull honk.”

“LO, praise of the prowess of people-kings of spear-armed Danes, in days long sped, we have heard, and what honor the athelings won!”
Dunawake got it with Beowulf

“A man with binoculars. That is how it began: with a man standing by the side of the road, on a crest overlooking a small Arizona town, on a winter night.”
Laughing Lagomorph is correct, Andromeda Strain

[Biffy_the_Elephant_Shrew]

Here’s a new one:

“A sum of money is a leading character in this tale about people, just as a sum of honey might properly be a leading character in a tale about bees.”

[cckerberos]

@ThirdCultureKid

Is this Orwell, Down and Out]?

Yes, that’s correct.

[Reno_Nevada]

@Kizarvexius

Quote the first:
“In that pleasant district of merry England which is watered by the river Don, there extended in ancient times a large forest, covering the greater part of the beautiful hills and valleys which lie between Sheffield and the pleasant town of Doncaster.”

OK, I hope it is not cheating if I happen to pick up the book in question…and, I should say, I was close before, since it does feature the good Earl of Huntingdon…

This is *Ivanhoe * by Sir Walter Scott.

Another:

Only at one point along the straight earth-road leading from Loo-chow
to Yu-ping was there any shade, a wood of stunted growth, and here XXX cast himself down in refuge from the noontide sun and slept.

With a given name excised, else it were too easy

[Kizarvexius]

@Reno Nevada

OK, I hope it is not cheating if I happen to pick up the book in question…and, I should say, I was close before, since it does feature the good Earl of Huntingdon…

This is *Ivanhoe * by Sir Walter Scott.

Yea, verily. 'Tis so.

[Elendil_s_Heir]

@Elendil's Heir

…
(1) “At the first gesture of morning, flies began stirring.”

(2) “Hello? Hello? Yes, I see it works. Good.”

(3) “I don’t usually go to a bar with one of my students. It is almost always a mistake.”

No one’s answered these, and it’s been awhile, so I’ll tell you:

1. Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier

2. Tuf Voyaging, by George R.R. Martin (a longtime favorite book)

3. In the Cut, by Susanna Moore