Here are my favorite opening lines in science fiction and fantasy novels:
- “The sky above the port was the color of television tuned to a dead channel.”
Neuromancer, William Gibson. - "It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking 13.”
1984, George Orwell. - "It was a pleasure to burn.”
Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury. - "Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea."
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams. - "All children, except one, grow up."
Peter Pan, J. M. Barrie - "The year that Buttercup was born, the most beautiful woman in the world was a French scullery maid named Annette."
The Princess Bride, William Goldman - “What’s it going to be then, eh?” There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim, and we sat in the Korova Milkbar trying to make up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening, a flip dark chill winter bastard though dry.
Clockwork Orange, Anthony Burgess. - "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.”
The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien. - “Marley was dead, to begin with.”
A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens - “Lyra and her daemon moved through the darkening Hall, taking care to keep to one side, out of sight of the kitchen.”
The Golden Compass, Philip Pullman
Ok, A Christmas Carol isn’t technically considered SF/F, but it does have ghosts in it.
What are your favorite opening lines? Any genre.