Re-examining Those All-Important First Sentences for Works of Fiction

I'm fiddling with a new fiction project, The Fat Cat, and I really liked its first sentence:

I hadn't seen that good-lookin' motherfucker for almost a year when he walked in with his partner to ask me about the dead dancer found that morning in our dumpster.

It made me think how important first sentences are.

I've always hated the cute little human relation's phrase: "You only have one chance to make a first impression." But, with fiction, it is so true. It really has to feel right. It's like the opening line of a song, and I think writing is like music. If you get the words right and the rhythm right, you make a kind of music in the reader's brain that resonates.

Made me go back and look at my first sentences and comment on them.

I like the first line for The Fat Cat I think because the phrase: ...the dead dancer found that morning in our dumpster really hits those d sounds and creates great imagery.

Some other first lines, in no particular order:

The Notebook

I had two phone calls from Don before he killed himself.

I like the simplicity. It tells us something important happened and that someone should have know it was going to happen.

Tell Us Everything

Cricket carefully backed her crummy car, which needed a motor mount bolt replaced, down her cousin’s driveway.

I like this simple introduction of this character. I think it sets the tone right away.

It Was Me (I)

On my drive home from work Friday evening I stopped at a traffic light, glanced left over at the driver in the other lane and saw myself.

How better else to start off this Rod Serling "Twilight Zone" type of story?

Blow Up the Roses

Mr. Brown closed the door on the whimpers and walked up the stairs to take a shower.

How can you not want to know more about Mr. Brown?

Blue Kansas Sky

There really is a Kansas sky, wide as the land is flat.

Lyrical intro for a story based around a snooker game.

Downswing

It wasn't until the 15th green that I realized how alone I was.

Really? You play 15 holes of golf and then realize you are alone on the course? Must be something else going on.

Innocent Passage

The skies were cloudy all day.

Any Kansan knows our state song with the verse "And the skies are not cloudy all day." Yet there are some days that are cloudy all day and that sets up the anomaly for this loss of innocence short story.

One More Victim

The most important summer of my life began with a house-shaking thunder boomer that woke me up on a Thursday night in 1958 near the end of my fifth-grade school year.

Sometimes you just set the opening like you were laying a foundation stone.

Rabbletown: Life in These United Christian States of Holy America

Bob Crowley, drunk and very tired, almost tripped over the broken toy truck before kicking it out of his way then trudging around the side of the house to the back of a former duplex that now housed six families of 50-some Christian souls.

This is a first sentence as a simple, but engaging scene setter.

The Saltness of Time

"I like these kinds of snows. They cancel things out."

I don't open many stories with dialogue, but this I thought would draw a reader in.

SPILL

Fred Underwood was driving his 15-year-old, once-white, now rust-speckled Nissan pickup six miles over the speed limit on his way to deliver the head of a dog to the state’s vet school for rabies testing when several things happened to him.

Another scene-setter opening sentence, and if that head of a dog doesn't get you to read the next sentence, nothing will.

The 41st Sermon

The Volvo in the closed garage purred quietly as it exhaled the gas that Jim Garrison inhaled.

I think this opening line imparts so much information and tone. I really like it. The use of exhale and inhale creates a great rhythm.

The Strange Case of James Kirkland Pilley

Edward Hawthorne had no premonition of the first disturbing and later horrifying consequences that would result from his joining the Friends of Pilley Park Garden Society.

This is my homage to the great horror writer H.P Lovecraft. I hope this is the kind of sentence that he would have written and would have loved the phrase "Friends of Pilley Park Garden Society."

Gas Prices Bumping $4 Got You Down?

As gas prices start to bump that $4 level you might need some comic relief that SPILL can provide. Here's the opening: 

Fred Underwood was driving his 15-year-old, once-white, now rust-speckled Nissan pickup six miles over the speed limit on his way to deliver the head of a dog to the state’s vet school for rabies testing when several things happened to him.

He saw a sign announcing—as though proud of the fact—that gasoline at the upcoming station was selling for $4.15 a gallon. He looked into the rear view mirror when he heard a siren and confirmed that, indeed, a police car was chasing him. He uttered, “Shit,” but then felt his body swept with euphoria: an idea smacked him that would make him rich.

And here's a review that just came in the other day, from England of all places!

This darkly satirical comedy, depicting a failed schoolmaster's attempt to take on the American political system evokes memories of Our Man in Havana. Mr Attwood has the true comedian's lightness of touch, and there is hardly a dull moment in it. Particularly fine were the descriptions of Our Hero's experiences as a schoolmaster. The action moves well throughout the book, and although I found the ending a little abrupt, on reflection I don't know that the more conventional, drawn-out epilogue chapter would have added anything worthwhile to it.
Comic fiction lives or dies by its characters, and this is a particular strength in Spill. Even minor characters are lovingly drawn; no cardboard cutouts here, they are all real and alive. A traditional third person narrative is used, with subtle shifts to its tone depending on the point of view. I have always felt that it is in his use of narrative that a writer shows his true quality, and Mr Attwood passes this acid test with flying colours.


SPILL: Big Oil + Hot Sex = Game On

Rabbletown Connects With Former Fundamentalist

Rabbletown: Life in These United Christian States of Holy America really connects with many people. It's a dystopia work set in 2084 when the Religious Right has been in the control for decades and the Pastor President and Pastor Governors rule with a Bible in each fist and the computer in your hovel. I worked on it for a long time, ever since Pat Robertson got involved in influencing elections. But I had written myself into a corner, and it just sat there until one day I revisited it and realized I had to let Bobby, the son of a stone mason, do his thing.

Katy Sozaeva is a top 500 Amazon reviewer, which means this woman reads A LOT OF BOOKS. She wrote her longest review for Rabbletown, and she has said it is the best book she HAS EVER READ. I think the caps are justified. I'll include the video she let me do about that review here, but just in is another review from a reader who really connected with the work. This kind of response is extraordinarily gratifying for a writer. And I really liked the last two sentences.

WOW! I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. This book touched my heart in such a way that I can't explain in words. Growing up in a fundamentalist church, understanding, later in life, the damage it did to me, makes this book terrifying in one way but so outrageously funny in another. This book takes place in the future. Everyone has nuked each other and there's not much left in the United States. The United States has turned into dictatorship run by the descendants of Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. There are many parallels from the Bible, for example, a savior comes in the form of a boy named Bobby, a stone mason's son (instead of a carpenter's son, like Jesus). I don't want to give away too much of the plot without ruining it for you. But you have to read this. It's different from anything you've ever read. What a mind this author has. It makes me wonder about his background.

The review is here: