katecavanaugh
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OPENING LINES | favorites, volunteers, surveys, & moooore!
🕑 Added 2023-03-21 19:23:03 +0000 UTCHey y'all, heyyyyy!
I can't believe we're in the back third of March. Like, excuse me, where has the time gone? Why so fast? WHATISHAPPENING?
Before I dive into the purpose of this post (and all the fun opening line nonsense), I'd like to brag for a moment. This is quite possibly the only thing I'll "finish" this month, so I'd like to present, my Pierre the Penguin:
(Zelda's clearly very proud too. Also confused. But mostly proud.)
This was from a "Woobles" beginner crochet kit and I cannot recommend them enough! They have a bunch of videos to walk you through the process and as a visual, trial/error learner, it was a lot easier than trying to read and understand a pattern on my own. Super recommend them if you've been wanting to play around with another hobby!
And I also have a tiny little book I'm in the process of making, but haven't added the pages to yet:
TA-DA! I want to make them in all the colors of the rainbow and create a little crochet book army bahahah.
Okay, okay, on to everything opening lines.
Because I'm currently re-writing Project Death, I find my brain regularly roaming back to the opening line of the novel. It's been set since about Draft 2, which is unusual for me. Now I'm tinkering. It's still mostly the same, just a word or two rearranged or rephrased. But of course, it got me thinking just how important opening lines can be.
And in a funny coincidence, the next day I opened Reddit up to r/books, and found this thread. (It was really fun to see how many people agreed on the GOAT opening lines!)
All of this combined, I had a couple fun ideas for a potential video "experiment" -- but I'll need your help. :)
First: What do you think is the most ICONIC opening line? What's your favorite first line ever?
Second: Why do you think that line is so incredible? (Did it immediately grab you? Is it wonderful foreshadowing of the story to come?)
Third: What elements do you think make an iconic opening line? (If you were to sort of reverse engineer it?)
Fourth: Following the above, would you like to ATTEMPT to create an iconic opening line? It doesn't need to be part of your actual story, but just a line that you think could make someone's own "personal fav" in the future? IF SO, I have a little form for you to fill out! (My plan is to select a few to highlight or have people vote on the greatest of the greatest sort of thing. So you can stay anonymous or have your name/handle shouted out, if you want!)
If you want to fill out the form, you can find it here!
My plan for the experiment is to research the books I own (maybe sort by genre to see if there are any opening line trends), a lot of the books already listed in the Reddit thread, y'alls suggestions, and then try to craft 10 "iconic" opening lines of my own. :)
It'll be fun!!
Finally, a quick reminder! The Storytellers' Hearth (previously the World Wide Writeathon) is hosting March's Weekend Relay THIS SATURDAY AND SUNDAY! I'll be hosting on my channel -- with the wonderful J.C. Carpenter & Ashely B. Pedigo as co-hosts -- and fundraising for NaNoWriMo. You can catch us on Sunday, the 26th, at 11:00 EDT. And all the links to the other sprints are in the description box as well.
I'll be doing a ~chill~ 48-hour re-writeathon (if such a thing is possible, lololol) during the Relay. Hope to see y'all there!
In the meantime, HAPPY WRITING!
Comments
Zara Hoffman
1. It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife. - Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen 2. It’s a unilateral statement of fact which means the book will either prove or disprove it and I’m intrigued. The voice is also strong and I like the tone so I’m on board to read more. 3. Kind of what I said for #2 but I need to get the voice and tone of the story I’m about to read, and I need my interest to be piqued in some way or another (doesn’t have to be with a thesis statement like here). The first line of 1984 by George Orwell mentions clocks striking thirteen which is intriguing because analog clocks (which can strike an hour, and digital clocks can’t) don’t have that digit on them which immediately made me wonder how that world was different from ours
Matthias Grosser
I must, of course, plug my favourite book, House on the Cerulean Sea: "Oh dear," Linus Baker said, wiping the sweat from his brow. "This is most unusual." Makes me CACKLE, considering the entire book is about a bunch of children with superpowers, one of which is literally the antichrist, and how said children adopt him as their father and he can't go back to a normal life. Just wait, Linus, just wait.
