First Lines Meme

From tetralogy.

 

Rules:

 

List the first lines of your last 20 stories. (If you have less than 20, just list them all.)

See if there are any patterns.

Choose your favorite opening line.

 

1. Shen Yuan’s friends—back when she’d still had friends who called her Shen Yuan—had used to tease her relentlessly about her whole “Proud Immortal Demon Way” thing. (Peerless Melons vs the Patriarchy)

2. Stepping through Xin Mo’s portals had once made Luo Binghe stumble. (This is How BingGe Can Still Win)

3. Luo Binghe slams additional potions into her qiankun bag, pulling its strings taunt and knotting them double as she shuts the apothecary cabinet’s drawer with her hip. (Natural Remedies for PMS Symptoms)

4. One night, Luo Binghe notices something odd about the way his blood is pooling on the floor of the woodshed. (Plastromancy)

5. The rut had been excusable; Shen Qingqiu had excused it. (Ungovernable)

6. It suits the Federation to pretend that humanity is more or less a historically, politically and culturally united entity. (AQ)

 

* Skipping SVSSS Miscellany *

 

7. When he was very young, Shen Yuan’s mother sat down on the boy’s bed, took her third son’s hands in hers and explained his unique situation to him. (Living With a Tiger)

8. Panting, Takami Miho took the gorge at a hard run. (Anyways, Stan Shen Qingqiu)

9. Luo Binghe’s entire body aches, but when he forces open heavy eyelids it’s his uninjured wrist he stares at. (How To Stop Being Strung Along By A Guy & Get What You Deserve: 5 Steps to a Serious Relationship!)

 

* Skipping SVSSS Meta *

 

10. They were on the fringes of the Demon Realm proper. (The Favourite)

11. The demonic realms conquered the better part of the human realms some centuries ago, and use their largely-unintegrated territories as they like. (Wrong Genre Savvy )

12. Ming Fan would never have ended up in this cavern in the first place if it weren’t for Shen Qingqiu’s ridiculous concern for Luo Binghe, who Ming Fan considered the source of not all, but arguably most, of the great problems of his life. (NIGHTMARE, attacked by Southern Succubi!! - Ming Fan Qing Jing Mission Road Trip (collab feat. Luo Binghe))

13. Wei Wuxian and his brother were not precisely reconciled. (Wei Wuxian's Discreet Dating Service: Hot Rogue Cultivators In Your Area!)

14. Jiang Wanyin was minding his own business in Lotus Pier, much as he had for over a decade, when he began to experience regular bouts of nausea. (Jiang Cheng the Virgin)

15. When he found the scroll, Luo Binghe tempered his excitement with a harsh caution to himself. (Without a Clue)

 

* Skipping One Where: a Miscellany/Commonplace Book *

 

16. Shen Qingqiu had always admired Luo Binghe’s decisiveness: the way he knew what he wanted, and how capable he was of cutting through the vagaries of the world and the opposition of his enemies to get it. (Git Gud)

17. As he tried to gulp down sheer terror (which rose in his throat like bile and gagged him, even as his stomach lurched), Wei Wuxian wondered what had kept him from even considering, all the while he’d begged Wen Qing to do this, that she could have lied about needing his continuous consent? (Core-Thieving Hand)

18. Shen Yuan wouldn’t have been able to say what he needed to be actually happy rather than merely content to save his life. (Size Empress)

19. Lan Wangji meets Wei Wuxian at a summer orchestra camp held at the prestigious classical music conservatory Lan Wangji attends year-round. (Needle Drop)

20. Longfang did her level best not to make any expression whatever as Emperor Luo Binghe reviewed her manifest for the semi-annual textile importation. (Help! My Boss is a Bitch.)

 

I don’t consider first sentences particularly important to my writing process, or really tend to remember others’ first sentences. I think these largely function like tag questions, serving as a soft set-up for a punchier rejoinder. I seem to almost always start with the lead character and action verbs, unless I’m dropping some kind of anthropological set up. The person I got this from did some nice prose stuff that wasn’t so focal character-centred, and it might be worthwhile to see if I could achieve a similar effect. I’m really almost never happy with my prose as such, and I think this kind of meme makes me uncomfortably aware of clumpy infelicities. (I actually fixed one of the above because of this meme.) I don't love the flow of 5, but I like the idea of it. I don't think I have a favourite, per se. Maybe 4?