10 Openings that made me buy the book

Sometimes you know from the first page or even paragraph that you’re going to love a book. These are some of my favourite beginnings.

1. Last night I dreamed I went to Manderley again. – Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
2. Marley was dead, to begin with. – A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
3. Ten days after the war ended my sister Laura drove a car off a bridge. – The Blind Assassin, Margaret Attwood.
4. The snow in the mountains was melting and Bunny had been dead for several weeks before we came to understand the gravity of our situation. – The Secret History, Donna Tartt.
5. If you really want to hear about it the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born and what my lousy childhood was like…and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth. – The Catcher In the Rye, JD Salinger
6. Hale knew before he had been in Brighton three hours that they meant to murder him. – Brighton Rock, Graham Greene.
7. It was the day my grandmother exploded. – the Crow Road, Iain Banks
8. Isabel Dalhousie saw the young man fall from the edge of the upper circle, from the gods.
9. There was nobody there to meet him. – The Outcast, Sadie Jones
10. It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn’t know what I was doing in New York.- The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath

Which opening lines have made you determined to read a book?

Advertisement