Books and The Love of Reading

Amazon Question Today 

What is your all-time favorite opening line to a book?

Not sure I really have a Favorite but there are those which stick with us through life:

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair."
- Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities (1859)

"Call me Ishmael."
- Herman Melville, Moby Dick (1851)

"There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it."
- C. S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952)

"When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow."
- Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird (1960)

When Mr Bilbo Baggins of Bag End announced that he would shortly be celebrating his eleventy-first birthday with a party of special magnificence, there was much talk and excitement in Hobbiton."
- J.R.R. Tolkien (John Ronald Reuel Tolkien), The Lord of the Rings (1954-1955)

Gone With the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell

First Line:  Scarlett O'Hara was not beautiful, but men seldom realized it when caught by her charm as the Tarleton twins were.

 Last Line:  "After all, tomorrow is another day."

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum

First Line:  Dorothy lived in the midst of the great Kansas prairies, with Uncle Henry, who was a farmer, and Aunt Em, who was the farmer's wife.

Last Line:  "From the Land of Oz," said Dorothy gravely. "And here is Toto, too. And oh, Aunt Em! I'm so glad to be at home again!"

Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen

First Line:  IT is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.

Last Line:  With the Gardiners, they were always on the most intimate terms. Darcy, as well as Elizabeth, really loved them; and they were both ever sensible of the warmest gratitude towards the persons who, by bringing her into Derbyshire, had been the means of uniting them.