Flash Fiction Challenge: Post An Opening Sentence
This one is pretty simple:
Write an opening sentence.
Post it in the comments below.
Any genre will do, really, though versatility has value.
The sentence should be on the shorter side. Let’s say, mmm, no more than 25 words. Some things to avoid, since sometimes folks fall into these traps: avoid blood, death, dead people, kids being hurt, and so forth. Think original. Conceive of a sentence that, when crafted right, is a strong hook. The kind that makes people want to read further. It makes them want to know more. Compelling and maddening in equal measure.
By next Friday, I will pick between five and ten I really like, and I’ll pop them into next week’s challenge, and you guys can choose one of those I pick to serve as the opening sentence to a new piece of flash fiction.
Today, no story necessary, though.
Just an opening line.
Due by next Friday, 2/26, noon EST.
February 25, 2016 @ 9:33 AM
Never again shall I run in between two men about to duel at sunrise.
February 25, 2016 @ 10:45 AM
She is an ocean; she is a mountain; she is a monsoon—-and she is no one.
February 25, 2016 @ 2:50 PM
Epic..as they say.
February 25, 2016 @ 10:49 AM
The cold froze Lin’s breath deep in her throat, turning it silver and sharp before it had even left her lips.
February 25, 2016 @ 11:06 AM
I like this !
February 25, 2016 @ 2:27 PM
Nice one.
February 25, 2016 @ 2:51 PM
Now that’s cold!
February 25, 2016 @ 12:38 PM
If you remember nothing else about this story, remember this: Gopher was always right.
February 25, 2016 @ 1:43 PM
Any message written on liver pate’ is probably a bad omen.
February 25, 2016 @ 3:30 PM
If Lisbon Bester had known that a single four-minute egg was to be the reason for his downfall, he probably would have ordered the quick and efficient killing of every single laying hen known to man.
February 25, 2016 @ 4:16 PM
In the glow of the forge the scars on the dusk of his forearms were stars.
February 25, 2016 @ 4:22 PM
Sometimes it pays to be forgettable – and well armed.
February 25, 2016 @ 5:19 PM
“Of all the things I expected to find in my tomato soup, this wasn’t one of them.”
February 25, 2016 @ 6:21 PM
I was less concerned that I had conceived the fetus growing within me despite living in the celibate isolation of my underground bunker, than I was about the growths sprouting from my shoulder blades and increasingly disrupting my sleep.
Lili Nemo
February 25, 2016 @ 8:19 PM
They had deserved so many more years of ordinary and boring than they’d got.
February 25, 2016 @ 8:45 PM
Shadows can fill anything, did you know that?
February 25, 2016 @ 9:12 PM
Had I arrived six minutes earlier I would have been on a plane to freedom, but instead I ran straight into my future wife.
February 25, 2016 @ 9:37 PM
He pressed the accelerator harder as if the brute force would make it race ahead of the jam; slamming the breaks at the next instant.
February 26, 2016 @ 7:46 AM
The piles littered every service spoke of disappointment and of a life in despair.
February 26, 2016 @ 11:28 AM
My hands always shake, after I kill myself because I’m too hungry.
February 26, 2016 @ 11:29 AM
My fake daughter loves pancakes, and she won’t let me go -ever.
February 26, 2016 @ 11:36 AM
Wait, this one is better:
My daughter Emily loves pancakes with chocolate chips and bananas, but this Emily at the table is all wrong, and she won’t let me go.
February 26, 2016 @ 12:13 PM
The tiger yawned, looked at me pitifully, folded his paws and studied my CV.
February 26, 2016 @ 12:31 PM
-not trying to hide his boredom.
February 26, 2016 @ 12:29 PM
Sleipnir dipped over the event horizon, and started broadcasting “I got you Babe” over all emergency channels.
February 26, 2016 @ 1:37 PM
“Fuck off, grasshopper,” the monks sucked his teeth and let his arrow fly.
February 26, 2016 @ 2:10 PM
“Don’t know, whose dream is this anyway,” asked the baboon, “I’m bored already!”
February 26, 2016 @ 2:33 PM
Only one more, then I’ll stop. Probably.
“Sorry,” I managed a confused face, “I don’t speak bullshit.”
Friday Flash Fiction: Wrecker
February 26, 2016 @ 2:50 PM
[…] new, a feature where I share rough short stories written either as an exercise or something like Chuck Wendig’s Flash Fiction Challenges. This might not sound like a big deal, but for me, sharing raw work is like standing naked on a […]
Flash Fiction Challenge: Pick A Sentence And Go « terribleminds: chuck wendig
February 26, 2016 @ 2:54 PM
[…] I’d like to note that last week’s post garnered 500+ entries. […]
March 1, 2016 @ 2:32 AM
Denied, the letter said.
March 1, 2016 @ 4:36 AM
There’s no denying this is a great opener.
March 3, 2016 @ 7:18 PM
She opened her eyes to a sepia sky, like someone’s memory, and she knew this day was going to be different.
March 4, 2016 @ 7:01 PM
Well done Katarina. I hear in the writing world sepia is the new orange which is the old black.
March 12, 2016 @ 3:56 PM
It was a butchered mangle of a language; the sounds too harsh, the stresses too frequent, the consonants too throaty.