Opening Lines

A list of book opening lines I found enjoyable (there's a link to an update on the page with more opening lines) http://classicilliterature.blogspot.com/2008/01/how-to-start-book-off-right.html. Take a read (middle-clicking will pop it in a new tab), and come back. I'll wait.

You know, he's right. Some of my favorite books I've known I'll like from the first line. One that comes up again and again in the comments is probably the best example.

The man in black fled across the desert and the gunslinger followed.
--The Gunslinger, Stephen King

Even the first time reading it, I could hear it in my mind. Actually I heard the voice of Sam Elliot drawling through the line, putting nearly a full stop between the words "desert and" to put that narrator's air of inevitability to the chase that ends -- and truly begins -- with the conclusion of the book. Or Stephen Fry saying:

"Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western
Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small un-regarded yellow sun."
-- The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams

in that impeccable accent of his. I don't know why I 'hear' things I read. The way my mind processes information, I guess.