The topic says we can post and discuss published 13 line hooks so I have a couple that worked really well and thought I'd throw them out for discussion.

from SPIN STATE by Chris Moriarty pub.Bantam Books 2003 1st 13 lines of printed text

They cold-shipped her out, flash-frozen, body still bruised from last-minute upgrades.

Later she remembered only pieces of the raid. The touch of a hand. The crack of rifle fire. A face flashing bright as a fish's rise in dark water. And what she did remember she couldn't talk about, or the psych-techs would know she'd been hacking her own memory.

But that was later. After the court-martial. After jump fade and the rehab tanks had stolen it from her. Before that the memory was still crisp and clear and unedited. Still hers.

After all, she'd been there.

Some of it is a bit awkward to follow for non SF readers, I'd imagine. But there is so much sheer energy in the words that I couldn't leave the book behind in the store. It promised a really good story. Unfortunately, the novel itself lacks clarity. There is too much techie stuff obscuring the story. But the opening sucked me in fast.

[This message has been edited by arriki (edited December 23, 2005).]

the day war was declared, a rain of telephones fell clattering to the cobblestones from the skies above Novy Petrograd. Some of them had half melted in the heat of re-entry; others pinged and ticked, cooling rapidly in the postdawn chill. An inquisitive pigeon hopped close, head cocked to one side; it pecked at the shiny case of one such device, then fluttered away in alarm when it beeped. A tinny voice spoke: “Hello? Will you entertain us?”

The Festival had come to Rochard’s World.

I remember picking up Neuromancer by William Gibson many moons ago and reading the first line:

The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.

For me that just set the mood of the book nicely. Can't remember all the first thirteen right now, but a little further down though he writes:

He saw Case and smiled, his teeth a webwork of East European steel and brown decay.

I just had to buy after the first few paragraphs, think I read it in a day.

BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! Four shots ripped into my gut.

From ENTOMBED by Linda Fairstein

I looked at the pool of dried blood that covered the third floor landing of a brownstone on one of the safest residential blocks in Manhattan and wondered how the young woman who’d been left there to die yesterday, her chest pierced by a steak knife, could still be alive this afternoon.

Mercer Wallace crouched beside the stained flooring, pointing out for me the smaller areas of discoloration. “These smudges, I figure, are partial imprints of the perp’s shoe. He must have lost his footing over there.”

The blood streaked away from the door of the victim’s apartment, as though her attacker had slid in the slippery fluid and stumbled to the top of the staircase.

That’s the first 13 in 12 point courier. (In the book this is the first 16 lines and is the entire first page of story.)

Maybe, if you’re not a mystery fan, this isn’t all that attractive. Or, maybe it is a matter of taste.

To me, the story began fast. The attack. The investigators examining the scene. Two active characters: the pov and this Mercer Wallace. WE don’t know who they are (unless you’ve read other books by Linda Fairstein), but that doesn’t hinder me…not yet. The details are clear and evocative.

Is it more likely (easier) to open with character rather than story? Does learning about a character draw more people in faster?

Hmmm...what avenues ARE there?

story as in plot details

character as in learning about an interesting character

setting as in describing an interesting location

situation as in describing an interesting problem

philosophy as in ruminating (?) over some philosophical idea that is the foundation (?) of the story

other ?????

I see this philosophical type of opening a lot. It works. You don't have to open with live action. An entertainingly phrased musing on the subject can work.

Take the opening to Harlan Corben's JUST ONE LOOK

There are sudden rips. There are tears in your life, deep knife wounds that slash through your flesh. Your life is one thing, then it is shredded into another. It comes apart as though gutted in a belly slit. And then there are those moments when your life simply unravels. A loose thread is pulled. A seam gives way. The change is slow at first, nearly imperceptible.

For Grace Lawson, the unraveling began at the Photomat.

She was about to enter the....

Well, "I" found this an interesting opening. I bought the book. Hardback. The philopsophizing is about what is going to happen. It gives me, as reader, an idea of what I'm going to see happen. Like telling me there is a bomb under the conference table. I read on, curious to see what happens. For me, this was far more interesting than merely showing Grace going into the Photomat.

I've seen where riffs like this can give a lot of backstory in an intriguing way.

Like the opening of CHAIN OF COMMAND by Casper Weinberger and Peter Schweizer

Michael Delaney sometimes had his doubts about people. But a gun? No doubts there. A gun would never lie to you, would never tell you it loved you and then leave you for somebody else, would never take your kids away, would never flatter you and then stab you in the back. You treated a gun right and it would be your friend forever.

Back in his drinking days, Delaney used to riff on this particular subject after he'd gotten eight or ten fingers of single malt in him. It had been kind of a joke, but kind of not.

But not now. Right now it was not funny at all.

Once you made friends with a gun, you knew that gun better than you knew your brother. And the gun in his hand was a stranger.

I made a deal with the roaches.

Why did this draw me into the story? First off, the idea of making a pact with roaches -- shiver! But there is some resonance working here. The words flow just right. Not too much information to obscure the idea. The few words open up a lot of pathways, pathways that flash through my mind even as I move on to the next paragraph.