Fourteen First Lines
I like the activity going around in LJ of listing the first sentence of fictional books that have been significant to you. I've decided to go with the first lines of youth novels, some I read in childhood, some I've read since on my own or as a teacher, but books that I love and are still in my collection. Feel free to guess, most of them are classics, some are dead easy, and I will supply the answers at the end of the post.
1. The house in the hollow was "a mile from anywhere"- so Maywood people said.
2. When I was quite small I would sometimes dream of a city- which was strange because it began before I even knew what a city was.
3. All children, except one, grow up.
4. "Where's Papa going with that ax?" said Fern to her mother as they were setting the table for breakfast.
5. The Canadian wilderness was white with snow.
6. Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.
7. It was a dark and stormy night.
8. Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy.
9. Among other public buildings in a certain town, which for many reasons it will be prudent to refrain from mentioning, and to which I assign no fictitious name, there is one anciently common to most towns, great or small: to wit, a workhouse; and in this workhouse was born; on a day and date which I need not trouble myself to repeat, inasmuch as it can be of no possible consequence to the reader in this stage of business at all events; the item of mortality whose name is prefixed to the head of this chapter.
10. Ba-room, ba-room, ba-room, baripity, baripity, baripity, baripity- Good.
11. In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.
12. Mrs. Rachel Lynde lived just where the Avonlea main road dipped into a little hollow, fringed with alders and ladies' eardrops and traversed by a brook that had its source away back in the woods of the old Cuthbert place; it was reputed to be an intricate, headlong brook in its earlier course through those woods, with dark secrets of pool and cascade; but by the time it reached Lynde's Hollow it was a quiet, well-conducted little stream, for not even a brook could run past Mrs. Rachel Lynde's door without due regard for decency and decorum; it probably was conscious that Mrs. Rachel was sitting at her window, keeping a sharp eye on everything that passed, from brooks and children up, and that if she noticed anything odd or out of place she would never rest until she had ferreted out the whys and wherefores thereof.
13. These two very old people are the father and mother of Mr. Bucket.
Answers:
1. Emily of New Moon by L. M. Mongomery
2. The Chrysalids by John Wyndham
3. Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie
4. Charlotte's Web by E.B. White
5. Paddle-to-the-Sea by Holling Clancy Holling
6. Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone by J.K. Rowling
7. A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L'Engle
8. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
9. Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
10. Bridge To Terebithia by Katherine Paterson
11. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
12. Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Mongomery
13. Charlie and The Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
Exercise log: I did 45 minutes of winter walking yesterday. I did 35 minutes of weights today. It's been a pretty lazy weekend, though I did get some packing done today.
1. The house in the hollow was "a mile from anywhere"- so Maywood people said.
2. When I was quite small I would sometimes dream of a city- which was strange because it began before I even knew what a city was.
3. All children, except one, grow up.
4. "Where's Papa going with that ax?" said Fern to her mother as they were setting the table for breakfast.
5. The Canadian wilderness was white with snow.
6. Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.
7. It was a dark and stormy night.
8. Once there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy.
9. Among other public buildings in a certain town, which for many reasons it will be prudent to refrain from mentioning, and to which I assign no fictitious name, there is one anciently common to most towns, great or small: to wit, a workhouse; and in this workhouse was born; on a day and date which I need not trouble myself to repeat, inasmuch as it can be of no possible consequence to the reader in this stage of business at all events; the item of mortality whose name is prefixed to the head of this chapter.
10. Ba-room, ba-room, ba-room, baripity, baripity, baripity, baripity- Good.
11. In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.
12. Mrs. Rachel Lynde lived just where the Avonlea main road dipped into a little hollow, fringed with alders and ladies' eardrops and traversed by a brook that had its source away back in the woods of the old Cuthbert place; it was reputed to be an intricate, headlong brook in its earlier course through those woods, with dark secrets of pool and cascade; but by the time it reached Lynde's Hollow it was a quiet, well-conducted little stream, for not even a brook could run past Mrs. Rachel Lynde's door without due regard for decency and decorum; it probably was conscious that Mrs. Rachel was sitting at her window, keeping a sharp eye on everything that passed, from brooks and children up, and that if she noticed anything odd or out of place she would never rest until she had ferreted out the whys and wherefores thereof.
13. These two very old people are the father and mother of Mr. Bucket.
Answers:
1. Emily of New Moon by L. M. Mongomery
2. The Chrysalids by John Wyndham
3. Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie
4. Charlotte's Web by E.B. White
5. Paddle-to-the-Sea by Holling Clancy Holling
6. Harry Potter and The Philosopher's Stone by J.K. Rowling
7. A Wrinkle In Time by Madeleine L'Engle
8. The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis
9. Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens
10. Bridge To Terebithia by Katherine Paterson
11. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
12. Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Mongomery
13. Charlie and The Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
Exercise log: I did 45 minutes of winter walking yesterday. I did 35 minutes of weights today. It's been a pretty lazy weekend, though I did get some packing done today.