kickoff

Lots of writers obsess over crafting their first sentence— it’s as though they think the Writing Gods are going to weigh their souls against the feather of it.

There was quite a lively conversation about this on Reddit, with obsessives on one side and laissez-faire types on the other.

I found myself agreeing with someone known as u/Oberon_Swanson: to me, the first sentence of a book is like the first shot of a movie— there has to be one, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be a tour de force showing off every trick the writer can do. If it has style, so much the better— but an unobtrusive opening line can be just as effective as a flashy one. Bottom line is: does the first sentence make them read the second one?