Toby woke in a harsh fog of searing pain. His head felt as though it were in a vise, screaming from the long night of drinking the night before. The sun glaring through the window didn’t help his situation. Wincing, he cursed himself for not closing the damn drapes before he crashed. He groaned as he looked at the clock on his bedside table. The time showed 3:18 pm. His stomach felt empty, yet the last thing he wanted right now was food. He got up slowly and sat at the edge of the bed.
Once his head stopped swimming, he stood on shaking legs, ambled to the kitchen and opened the fridge. He thanked the gods when he saw the 6-pack in there. Thinking the hair of the dog would stop the excruciating pain in his skull, he reached for a cold beer, popped the cap, and drank long, hard swallows while
[This message has been edited by Kathleen Dalton Woodbury (edited March 21, 2011).]
quote:
Toby woke in a harsh fog of searing pain. His head felt as though it were in a vise, screaming from the long night of drinking the night before. The sun glaring through the window didn’t help his situation. Wincing...
Consider avoiding so many ings. Also I think the comma after vise is unnecessary, it makes it look for a second like the vise is screaming.
p.m., rather than pm.
You do give a good impression of a hangover, I've never had one but through this opening I can imagine it.
I would drop 'in there' from "...6-pack in there..." it sounds like he's talking to someone else about what he found. Also I don't know what to make of "The hair of the dog", if that's a beer you may want to put it in quotes with appropriate capitalization to indicate a title, otherwise I'm left confused...
Nice imagery of the guy leaning on the propped door, I'm imagining him as a little flabby, with a white sweaty t-shirt and blue boxers. Just saying how that one little thing can conjure associated images.
Now the ending about the blood, is good because it's just "oh something really did happen here."
But again, I wouldn't worry about this yet.
Toby woke in a harsh fog of searing pain. His head felt as though it was in a vise.
His head screamed from the excessive alcohol binge the night before. The sun glaring through
the window didn’t help his situation. He winced and cursed himself for not closing the
damn drapes before he crashed.
As for the worrying if the hook is set without having the middle - I plan to have this written in the near future and I'm just waiting for the muse to whisper in my ear. In the meantime, without a great beginning and hook, I won't have anything no matter if I have the beginning, middle and end completed. 
Thank you for pointing out the punctuation and grammatical errors. It's much appreciated.
Oh, and "Hair of the dog" is a saying. From Wikipedia:
"Hair of the dog" is a colloquial expression in the English language predominantly used to refer to alcohol that is consumed with the aim of lessening the effects of being hungover."
[This message has been edited by Drock0211 (edited March 20, 2011).]
quote:
His head felt as though it was in a vise. His head screamed...
You have 3 sentences to describe the pain in his head. I would suggest cutting it down to no more than 2, and try making the pain the subject instead of his head. I would also suggest dropping "Toby woke"--if you're going to start with him waking up, at least hide it behind some good images first. Something like "Pain screamed through his head, tightening like a vise," and then mention the alcohol binge the night before. We'll get that he just woke up.
Another way to avoid some of these same-sounding sentences is to get deeper into the POV. At the end, "He winced and cursed himself for not closing the damn drapes before he crashed" could become "Should have closed the damn drapes."
I would also second enigmaticuser's caution about getting the rest written before worrying about the hook. The best way to find a good voice for the book is to write it. Once you know what's happening in the middle, you'll probably have to rewrite the beginning anyway, and it'll be better for waiting. My first novel took 10 months to get to the end of the first draft because I kept going back and rewriting stuff, but I knocked out the first draft of my second novel in 12 weeks (and it was a whole lot better).
[This message has been edited by EmilyS (edited March 20, 2011).]
Toby groaned and looked at the clock on his bedside table. The time showed 3:18 p.m. His head throbbed and felt as though it were in a vise from a long night of drinking. The sun didn’t help. He winced and cursed himself for not closing the damn drapes before he crashed. His stomach felt empty, yet the last
thing he wanted was food. He sat up at the edge of the bed.
The way I see it, even if I were to wind up changing the entire story line, and have to re-write the beginning, everything I do with this story from now until the time it's finished is a learning experience. 