Recently, I’ve really enjoyed using the first line of various novels as starting points for my writing prompts, so I decided to compile this list of 7 wondrous first line writing prompts.
It’s interesting to see how another’s words can inspire you, direct you, and motivate you to find something new, and help you to create a whole new world. Use the line however it seems to work for you – be it your first line, a line in your text, or just as a source of inspiration. Draw from it, how you will.
Here are my recent favourites of first liners; use these prompts to direct your writing practice for 5 to 15 minutes – whichever time limit you have time for, each day this week:
- ”The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” — L. P. Hartley, The Go-Between (1953)
- “It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.” — George Orwell, 1984 (1949)
- “All this happened, more or less.” —Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five (1969)
- “All children, except one, grow up.” J. M. Barrie, Peter Pan (1911)
- “This is my favourite book in all the world, though I have never read it.” —William Goldman, The Princess Bride (1973)
- “If you are interested in stories with happy endings, you would be better off reading some other book.” —Lemony Snicket, Daniel Handler, A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Bad Beginning (1999)
- “Behind every man now alive stand thirty ghosts, for that is the ratio by which the dead outnumber the living.” —Arthur C. Clarke, 2001 – A Space Odyssey (1968)
Do you like this week’s prompts? What first line prompts do you like to use?
Happy Writing 😉
Erica
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