Good first paragraphs
When selecting a new book to read, one of my tests is the “grab value” of the opening paragraph. Author Charles Frazier (National Book Award Winner for Cold Mountain) has a knack for getting your attention in those critical first few words. Here’s the opening paragraph from his second book, Thirteen Moons
“There is no scatheless rapture. Love and time put me in this condition. I am leaving soon for the Nightland, where all the ghosts of men and animals yearn to travel. We’re called to it. I feel it pulling at me, same as everyone else. It is the last unmapped country, and a dark way getting there. A sorrowful path. And maybe not exactly Paradise at the other end. The belief I’ve acquired over a generous and nevertheless inadequate time on earth is that we arrive in the afterlife as broken as when we departed from the world. But, on the other hand, I’ve always enjoyed a journey.”
You can read my unusual review of Thirteen Moons at:
http://toozie.wordpress.com/2006/10/21/40/
