Writers are well aware of the importance of first lines. If a reader can open your book and be hooked by the first line or the first paragraph, you’ve baited the hook very well. I’m reading Sol Stein’s Stein on Writing, and his first major chapter after the introduction deals with the critical nature of first lines.

I am also finishing up Try Darkness by James Scott Bell (stick around for my review next week). I think it has the best opening line I’ve read in a looooong time:

“The nun hit me in the mouth and said, ‘Get out of my house.'”