Great Opening (but cut) Paragraphs

[Nobody of Consequence]

Inspired by Ayshela and Aardvark, it is my inestimable honour to present, for the pleasure of one and all who find it pleasurable, this here creative writing doo-hickey.

 

General idea: post what was your target author's choice of opening paragraph, but which was subsequently cut by the cold, heartless bastard editor/s before the book went into print. Doesn't have to be done seriously, so please feel free to parody, invent a title for a given author (eg J.K. Rowling's "Harry Potter And The Itchy Trigger Finger") or even hybridise (eg JRR Tolkien/CS Lewis' "The Hobbit, the Witch and the Wardrobe").

 

I'm keen to see what folk come up with, should be a hoot

[Nobody of Consequence]

To get the proverbial acting in the way the proverb suggests it ought to:

 

Warning: biblical parody follows

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Before the Beginning, God said, "Let there be Void," and He looked, but could not see anything. And the cries of the angels rose unto Heaven, and God harkened unto them, and agreed that perhaps it was lacking a certain something.

 

Book of Genesis, Prologue

[Ayshela]

(Ayshela wanders in, looks around, giggles madly and wanders out again before anyone notices her)

[Aardvark]

'To my darling Candy,

 

All characters in this book are fictional, and any reference to people, living or dead, is purely coincidental'

 

 

Mysterious first page of bible

 

Blatently stolen from Red Dwarf

[Ozymandias]

Life sucks, thought Holden Caulfield, and I will whine and soliloquize until people understand that deep meaning.

 

-The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger

 

~~~

 

Lenny ate mashed potatoes. A LOT of mashed potatoes. Then he petted them.

 

-Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck

 

~~~

 

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear... And when it is gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear is gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

 

-The Power of Positive Thinking, Norman Vincent Peale

 

~~~

 

"..a tale told by an idiot; full of sound and fury, and signifying nothing."

 

-William Shakespeare

 

-A Seperate Peace, John Knowles

 

~~~

 

Now kneel before Zod.

 

-any L. Ron Hubbard book

 

~~~

 

Harry Potter was dead to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Dumbledore signed it. And Dumbledore's name was good upon 'Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Harry was as dead as a door-nail.

 

-Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone, J.K. Rowling

[Ozymandias]

There really were no words to describe the lay of the land, or the things that happened there. It simply beggared description.

 

So here is the tale, in simplest terms possible.

 

-The Wheel of Time, Robert Jordan

[cryptomancer]

"Hey buddy, I think you had enough. You done nothing but sit here drinking like a fish and spouting tall tales all night. Who the hell are you anyway?"

 

Moby Dick - Herman Melville