Hook. Line. And Sinker.

Books are the great love of my life. Having said that, it should come as no surprise to you that I take this first sentence of a book very seriously. I am ruthless and unforgiving and almost never willing to give the writer a second chance to intoxicate me with their words.

The opening line to a book is as important as the first pick up line from a prospective love interest. It's the first time you realize whether you could be soul mates. It's the first time you feel any semblance of enchantment. And if it sits well, it's the equivalent of when you and your love hold hands for the first time, when he or she interlocks his fingers in yours and nothing--not even the mingling of perspiration in your palms can tear you apart. It's magic.

As I've said many times before, I often judge a book by its cover. But I also judge it by its opening line. Walking up and down the aisles of a bookstore, trolling for cover art that strikes my fancy, and then reading the first line of those books is like speed dating for the bookworm. You know within seconds whether you're going home with each other.

The laundry list below is an abridged version (because if I could, I would allow this list to chug on endlessly--or until I kick the can) of my favorite opening literary lines (encompassing short stories, novels, and poems):

(1) The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

I still remember the day my father took me to the Cemetery of Forgotten Books for the first time.

(2) A Grief Observed by C.S. Lewis

No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear.

(3) Any of the Berenstain Bears books by Stan and Jan Berenstain

Down a sunny dirt road deep in Bear Country...

(4) The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

Howard Roark laughed.

(5) The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

My name was Salmon, like the fish; first name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered on December 6, 1973.*

*This is the rare exception where two sentences will count for one. In fact, the first sentence was so well-written that it is nearly indecipherable how seamlessly it moves into the second.

(6) The Undertaking: Life Studies From the Dismal Trade by Thomas Lynch

In the Preface: At first I thought it meant he took them under.

In the First Chapter: Every year I bury a couple hundred of my townspeople.

(7) The Curious Case of Benjamin Button by F. Scott Fitzgerald

As long ago as 1860 it was the proper thing to be born at home.

(8) Palo Alto: Stories by James Franco

Ten years ago, my sophomore year in high school, I killed a woman on Halloween.

(9) Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen

I am ninety. Or ninety-three. One or the other.*

*One more exception. This could just as easily have been one sentence. In fact, it all falls on the first line of the novel. It's nothing short of brilliant.

(10) #389 by Emily Dickinson

There's been a death in the opposite house

As lately as today.

It should be noted that I am acutely aware that you, the reader, are probably wondering why I only chose only ten sentences.

Am I perhaps a book snob? The answer is yes. Am I close-minded to flipping to the second chapter when giving books the once over? The answer is yes. And incidentally, there is a reason the phrase is "the once over."

But the truth of the matter is, I am not well read. I am an avid reader. Most people can't go anywhere without a cell phone. Such is the case with me and my books. But I am not well read

---yet, anyway.

The list will continue to evolve and inevitably some of the aforementioned phrases that I am so enamored with this evening will ultimately be replace with the phraseology of some other wordsmith. But there is one, well maybe two, that will always sit pretty in my top ten favorites.

Fortunately, my secret's safe with me.