The End is Nigh
My deadline is approaching by which time Land of the Black Rose is to be submitted for full consideration at Marcher Lord Press.
I'm fretting about my opening chapter, my opening lines, my opening words. I've just got to get them right!
I've looked back over some of my favourite books, to see the ways in which they have started:
"This is a tale of a meeting of two lonesome, skinny, fairly old white men on a planet which was dying fast" (Vonnegut, Breakfast of Champions)
"It was in Warwick Castle that I came across the curious stranger whom I am going to talk about." (Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court)
"Marley was dead: to begin with." (Dickens, A Christmas Carol)
“It’s freezing - an extraordinary 0° fahrenheit - and it’s snowing, and in the language that is no longer mine the snow is qanik - big almost weightless crystals falling in clumps and covering the ground with a layer of pulverized white frost.” (Hoeg, Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow)
"Everyone had always said that John would be a preacher when he grew up, just like his father." (Baldwin, Go Tell it on the Mountain)
"When I left my office that beautiful spring day, I had no idea what was in store for me." (Rawlins, Where the Red Fern Grows)
"On the first Monday of the month of April, 1625, the market town of Meung, in which the author of Romance of the Rose was born, appeared to be in as perfect a state of revolution as if the Huguenots had just made a second La Rochelle of it." (Dumas, The Three Musketeers)
Of course, there are many, many more of them which I could have tracked down and quoted from, but would I really be any the wiser?
Here's the tips from the BBC about how to write the opening lines of a novel
I'm fretting about my opening chapter, my opening lines, my opening words. I've just got to get them right!
I've looked back over some of my favourite books, to see the ways in which they have started:
"This is a tale of a meeting of two lonesome, skinny, fairly old white men on a planet which was dying fast" (Vonnegut, Breakfast of Champions)
"It was in Warwick Castle that I came across the curious stranger whom I am going to talk about." (Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court)
"Marley was dead: to begin with." (Dickens, A Christmas Carol)
“It’s freezing - an extraordinary 0° fahrenheit - and it’s snowing, and in the language that is no longer mine the snow is qanik - big almost weightless crystals falling in clumps and covering the ground with a layer of pulverized white frost.” (Hoeg, Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow)
"Everyone had always said that John would be a preacher when he grew up, just like his father." (Baldwin, Go Tell it on the Mountain)
"When I left my office that beautiful spring day, I had no idea what was in store for me." (Rawlins, Where the Red Fern Grows)
"On the first Monday of the month of April, 1625, the market town of Meung, in which the author of Romance of the Rose was born, appeared to be in as perfect a state of revolution as if the Huguenots had just made a second La Rochelle of it." (Dumas, The Three Musketeers)
Of course, there are many, many more of them which I could have tracked down and quoted from, but would I really be any the wiser?
Here's the tips from the BBC about how to write the opening lines of a novel
- You must hook your reader. The tone of the writing should be fresh and distinctive. Create an immediate narrative pull; make the reader want to know "what happens next?".
And the opening line from Land of the Black Rose?
"A black cobra slithered out from underneath Shi-Yu's new coat that had fallen on the floor, drawn by the smells of either coffee and bread, or of yesterday's blood."
