An Opening Line...

7/16/2015

Yep, still here Friends, I'm just getting warmed up.

Right now I couldn't tell you where I've heard or read about the importance of the very first line in a story.  If I were to offer a suggestion, I would tell you to start with Stephen King's On Writing.

Speaking of Mr. King, it's one of his books that offers one of my favorite opening lines of all the books I've read.

"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed."

Just thinking about it still gives me a kind of cool shudder.  All of this to say that I was thinking about this idea of a 'perfect opening line' and played around with it some today.  I hope you like it.

It was the perfect place to be alone.  The view from his campsite is breathtaking.  The air is crisp and cold as fall has reached it's later days in the lower mountains.  A dusting of snow seems to muffle everything around him.  It is very, still.

He watches without moving, noticing the small signs of life around him; birds gliding from tree to tree, the quick, brief chatter of squirrels.  The approach of something silent and lethal does not go unnoticed.

This creature  makes no sound to give itself away.  It has not survived this long being unwary.  It approaches slowly, soon it will be exposed, in the open, unprotected by the camouflage of brush and trees.  It tenses, prepared to bound across the open space and take down it's quarry that it has tracked for miles.  It stops everything as the man turns, their eyes locking.

He sees what he expects, a wolf, at the edge of the clearing of his campsite, standing perfectly still at being discovered.  The animals body is tensed; to attack, to run, either could happen.  There are no words, there are no growls, no sound made to frighten or challenge.  But, there is an exchange, a message if you will.  An understanding is reached.

You will go your way and I will go mine, neither of us needs bleed today.

And just as silently, the wolf is gone, back among the trees and brush.

Hope there was something in there you liked.

Thanks,

D