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aa1c4ed
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It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.
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marriage
opening-lines
wife
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Jane Austen |
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c823a9c
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It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.
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opening-lines
dystopia
first-sentence
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George Orwell |
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126c8b4
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In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.
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opening-lines
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J.R.R. Tolkien |
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74dbcda
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It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
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opening-lines
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Charles Dickens |
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d1e3542
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It was a pleasure to burn.
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opening-lines
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Ray Bradbury |
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b324546
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Who is John Galt?
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philosophy
galt
taggart
objectivism
opening-lines
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Ayn Rand |
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3560a4a
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Mr. and Mrs. Dursley, of number four Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.
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opening-lines
human-nature
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J.K. Rowling |
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4422cf8
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Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show.
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opening-lines
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Charles Dickens |
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aa60303
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Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed.
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shaving
first-lines
ireland
opening-lines
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James Joyce |
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e43e90c
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If you're going to read this, don't bother.
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opening-lines
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Chuck Palahniuk |
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e808394
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Where shall we three meet again in thunder, lightning, or in rain? When the hurlyburly 's done, when the battle 's lost and won
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witches
first-lines
opening-lines
william-shakespeare
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William Shakespeare |
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66dd9ca
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Call me Ishmael.
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opening-lines
introduction
sobriquet
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Herman Melville |
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46127aa
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My name is Salmon, like the fish; first name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered.
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inspirational
first-lines
opening-lines
life-and-death
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Alice Sebold |
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9edb005
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You think you know how this story is going to end, but you don't.
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opening-lines
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Christopher Moore |
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716d43c
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No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water.
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opening-lines
first-sentence
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H.G. Wells |
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c67ce9b
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There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife.
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opening-lines
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Neil Gaiman |
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5ae7993
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It was almost December, and Jonas was beginning to be frightened.
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opening-lines
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Lois Lowry |
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7713c82
|
There is no lake at Camp Green Lake.
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opening-lines
|
Louis Sachar |
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ee155dd
|
There was no possibility of taking a walk that day.
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opening-sentences
walks
opening-lines
|
Charlotte Brontë |
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5658852
|
To the as-yet-unborn, to all innocent wisps of undifferentiated nothingness: Watch out for life.
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opening-lines
|
Kurt Vonnegut |
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b75dac8
|
Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.
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opening-lines
first-sentence
|
Rick Riordan |
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197793c
|
I am a vampire, and that is the truth.
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opening-lines
vampire
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Christopher Pike |
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4614834
|
Congratulations. The fact that you're reading this means you've taken one giant step closer to surviving until your next birthday.
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|
warning
opening-lines
|
James Patterson |
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32ea0b3
|
This is the story of a man named Eddie and it starts at the end, with Eddie dying in the sun. It may seem strange to start a story with and ending, but all endings are also beginnings. We just don't know it at the time.
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philosophical
inspirational
opening-lines
|
Mitch Albom |
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fc11d54
|
"Did you wish upon a star and take the time to try to make your wish come true? Did you try to paint the sunrise and find the gift of life within? Did you write a song just for the joy of it? Or write a poem just to feel the pain? Did you find a reason to ignore the petty injustices, the spoken barbs, or the envies, jealousies and greed that crossed your path? Did you wake up this morning and whisper inside, "Today, I'll find every reason to smile, and ignore the excuses to frown." Today will be the day I'll whisper nothing snide, I'll say nothing cruel. I'll be kind to my enemy, I'll embrace my friends, and for this one day, I'll forget the slights of the past. Today will be the day I'll live for the joy of it, laugh for the fun of it, and today, I'll love whether it's returned, forsaken, or simply ignored. And if you did, then your heart has joined the others who have as well, uniting, strengthening, and in a single heartbeat you've created a world of hope."
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opening-lines
|
Lora Leigh |
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b0bf82d
|
They murdered him.
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|
robert-cormier
opening-sentences
opening-lines
first-sentence
|
Robert Cormier |
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7cc6207
|
Serene was a word you could put to Brooklyn New York. Especially in the summer of 1912. Somber as a word was better. But it did not apply to Williamsburg Brooklyn. Prairie was lovely and Shenandoah had a beautiful sound but you couldn't fit those words into Brooklyn. Serene was the only word for it especially on a Saturday afternoon in summer.
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opening-lines
|
Betty Smith |
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d8fb8ae
|
Indian summer is like a woman.
|
|
simile
opening-lines
|
Grace Metalious |
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1c5ec37
|
It was 7 minutes after midnight. The dog was lying on the grass in the middle of the lawn in front of Mrs. Shears's house.
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opening-lines
|
Mark Haddon |
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087ef10
|
It was Wang Lung's marriage day.
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|
opening-lines
|
Pearl S. Buck |
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efc66ef
|
The baloney weighed the raven down, and the shopkeeper almost caught him as he whisked out the delicatessen door.
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|
humor
shoplifting
opening-lines
meat
|
Peter S. Beagle |
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a30c14f
|
Seated opposite me in the railway carriage, the elderly lady in the fox-fur shawl was recalling some of the murders that she had committed over the years.
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opening-lines
|
John Boyne |
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2d67074
|
First, I'll tell about the robbery our parents committed. Then about the murders, which happened later.
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|
opening-line-of-the-novel
opening-lines
|
Richard Ford |
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2bbc816
|
On the heights above the river Xzan, at the site of certain ancient ruins, Iucounu the Laughing Magician had built a manse to his private taste: an eccentric structure of steep gables, balconies, sky-walks, cupolas, together with three spiral green glass towers through which the red sunlight shone in twisted glints and peculiar colors.
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|
opening-lines
|
Jack Vance |
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18a5c5f
|
As he dropped the last grisly fragment of the dismembered and mutilated body into the small vat of nitric acid that was to devour every trace of the horrid evidence which might easily send him to the gallows, the man sank weakly into a chair and throwing his body forward upon his great, teak desk buried his face in his arms, breaking into dry, moaning sobs.
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|
opening-lines
|
Edgar Rice Burroughs |
|
97854a5
|
While I was still in Amsterdam, I dreamed about my mother for the first time in years.
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|
opening-lines
|
Donna Tartt |
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c71e5d2
|
How do you give someone a piece of sky? Late in February, she stood on Munich Street and watched a single giant cloud come over the hills like a white monster. It climbed the mountains. The sun was eclipsed, and in it's place, a white beast with a gray heart watched the town.
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|
opening-lines
|
Markus Zusak |
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65950e5
|
Mouths open to the sun, they sleep.
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|
opening-lines
|
Valeria Luiselli |
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dbf8170
|
Even in death the boys were trouble.
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|
opening-lines
|
Colson Whitehead |
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4c0a414
|
The first time Caesar approached Cora about running north, she said no.
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|
opening-lines
|
Colson Whitehead |
|
86af4ab
|
A green hunting cap squeezed the top of the fleshy balloon of a head.
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|
opening-lines
|
John Kennedy Toole |
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244f324
|
I've begun this letter five times and torn it up five times.
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|
opening-lines
|
James Baldwin |
|
28e01d2
|
They had flown from England to Minneapolis to look at a toilet.
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|
opening-lines
|
Nick Hornby |
|
53895f2
|
So, have you split up now?
|
|
opening-lines
|
Nick Hornby |
|
7ff3026
|
When people ask me what I do--taxi drivers, hairdressers--I tell them I work in an office.
|
|
opening-lines
|
Gail Honeyman |
|
0fe3181
|
I did stand-up comedy for eighteen years.
|
|
opening-lines
|
Steve Martin |
|
552a138
|
Son, Last Sunday the host of a popular news show ask me what it meant to loose my body.
|
|
opening-lines
|
Ta-Nehisi Coates |
|
3344967
|
How easy it was to disappear: A thousand trains a day entered or left Chicago.
|
|
opening-lines
|
Erik Larson |
|
197e6b8
|
At dusk the pour from the sky.
|
|
opening-lines
|
Anthony Doerr |
|
5d3b9fd
|
At dusk they pour from the sky.
|
|
opening-lines
|
Anthony Doerr |
|
727aeef
|
This story began, as all writing must, in failure.
|
|
opening-lines
|
Ta-Nehisi Coates |
|
49aee3b
|
I suppose that's exactly the problem--I wasn't to know any better.
|
|
opening-lines
|
Paul Beatty |