That classic challenge is back:
Do not write a story.
Nope. Mm-mm, don’t do it.
Instead:
Write only an opening sentence.
Not two sentences. Not three. One. Good. Sentence.
Drop the opening sentence in the comments below, and then next week we will make use of some of those sentences for the next challenge. You’ve got one week — due by next Friday, the 17th, noon EST. Get cracking, word-herders.
510 responses to “Flash Fiction Challenge: Time Again To Write An Opening Sentence”
My faith in the possibility of the impossible died a little more with each passing year.
(You can’t really expect us to come up with only one, can you?)
The journey between the walls of Ilyria and the gates of Bastandion is over five thousand miles, yet I had to make it on my own.
The baby wouldn’t stop screaming, so I ate him.
The day the robots came, I was playing baseball in the back garden with my kid sister.
It’s not every day you open the door to find your own future self knocking; in my case, it’s only on Wednesdays.
Thomas Edwards walked through his front door, closed it behind himself, and hung his head up on the hanger in the hall.
The snakes were moving again.
If there was one thing he hated more than anything else, Rodrigo would reflect later, it was women who smoked.
It took Jane a moment to realise what was unusual about the letter, but then she noticed that the postmark was the next day.
Phil had read that there were three thousand ways to kill a man; he only knew four hundred himself, but he was still an apprentice.
It was on the ninetieth day of the rains that I noticed something odd.
“Miaow,” said the dog.
The last one is brilliant :’)
That second one is a story all on it’s own. Not sure how one could expand on it. “Then the police showed up” maybe? Perhaps? What an opening line!
The envelope please.. and the award goes to ‘The Letter’.
“Well, that’s bleeding a lot more than I thought it would.”
Haha! Laughed out loud…
ha! Oh, I like this.
Glad to know I’m not the only person who thought this was funny. 🙂
I supposed this all started with paper: real paper.
“I TOLD you if you clicked on that link you’d burst into flames.”
Lol! That’s great!
I thought clicking on links that then empty your bank account was bad but you’re right, flames will beat that every time.
He opened the door and stared out at the vast blackness of space before him.
(Run-on sentence, probably?)
The stains from dragon vomit almost never came out, and being covered in it while standing in a pile of manure, Donovan should have known better than to think the day couldn’t get any worse.
What a beauty! Too good for a short; there’s a novel or series in this. Very nicely done.
https://p33d33.wordpress.com/2015/04/14/how-to-annoy-your-human-a-chuck-wendig-challenge-3/
Thank you, Tori. That was fun.
Glad you liked it. Nice story! Opening lines happens to be one of the areas I do well.
Granted once more the benefit of the doubt, Jirix’s apprentice had set the attic on fire again.
Nick glared at the detour sign and drove around it onto the darkening road.
Mindset of main character and a little something about his/her personality in 14 words- nicely done!!
I stood motionless, up to mis cojones in a murky soup that resembled the bitter cacao the savages drank, while creatures I was glad I could not see scrabbled past my legs.
[…] This challenge by Chuck Wendig seemed really fun. So I decided to try it out. This is my one good opening sentence: […]
“Let go of the past,” Madeline’s mother had always warned her, “for it feeds upon us all with great appetite, and wants to live again.”
thats an awesome saying. well done
Thank you!
This. I’m thinking dragons and time travel.
https://p33d33.wordpress.com/2015/04/14/madeline-a-chuck-wendig-challenge-1/
*Multiple Warnings* gooey romantic chick stuff, planetary distress, guy having to dance with girl, accidental bottom grabbing, songs ‘Let it Go’, ‘Because of You’, and ‘When the Rain Comes’ running through my head.
Thanks for the opening line, Brenna.
I just love this one…I don’t write science fiction so this opinions a world of possibilities.
The Forum demanded sacrifice for security, poverty for a prosperous community, and death for the chance to survive.
Awesome
“Hey, Buster, is that the best fucking outhouse you ever saw?”
LOL
Silenced gunshots are still pretty damn loud, no matter what the movies tell you.
There’s not much you can do with a Glock in your ear.
Having armed strangers of questionable intent breaking the front door down had always been one of Vaccre’s least favourite ways to begin a new day, not least because mahogany was just so expensive now.
iwords1@blogspot.com
When I wake up, the house is too quiet, my feet stretch out seeking to untangle myself form the sheet I’ve twisted into throughout the night.
iwords1.blogspot.com
She knew what he was going to ask; trouble was, she didn’t know what she was going to say.
The darkroom was decades unused, but she found it still suitable for developing photos; and as the contours of the images darkened and formed, so did her impression of the mother she thought she knew.
This is really disturbing. Hope you like horror.
https://p33d33.wordpress.com/2015/04/14/zee-a-chuck-wendig-challenge-2/
*Multiple warnings* strong continuous horror, catastrophic violence, disturbing image.*
Thanks for the first sentence, devsmess.
You’re welcome. 😀
If her raspy breathing didn’t alert him to her presence in the dank closet, surely the blood seeping underneath would.
well now i fear for her life. it sounds perfect for the start to a thriller or slasher.
My first kiss was a story I told myself until it was true.
Mmmm…like how this is both poignant and full of possibility!
They task us to perform duties that would scar our souls because they believe that we do not have souls.
The little girl stared in wide eyed horror at the giant monster sitting at the side of her bed, why in the hell was it trying to talk to her about Taylor Swift?
On January 1, 2016, at precisely 5:15AM, Mt Fuji – along with it’s thousands of New Year’s sunrise tourists – disappeared.
They thought flushing me out an air lock would kill me, HA!
When Ellaya Hault was deposited on the carriage walk at Tanglewood on Midsummer’s Eve, she knew nothing of its secretive inhabitants or the unsettling invitation her grandmother had received on her behalf.
“Tim, your place is going to be robbed tonight,” said the voice on the phone.
congrates you freaked me out and make me feel insecure!
Fuck them and their fancy words—Get out…”Get out!” she wailed.
Nice. From the inside to the outside of the character… pulled me into the story in my head.
Thanks! 🙂
I thought I was alone when something cold gripped my arm.
well that sounds *puts on glasses* chilling.
well done, its a creepy way to start something.
Hehe, chilling *winks* And thank you 🙂
As he slipped through the throngs of tourists like water, Jared mused that there are some major advantages to being dead.
From my cell i could see the noose fluttering in the wind, my time was fast running out.
– When Chairman Mao told us he had an idea, I was almost done chewing a bite of medium- rare steak.
– The actual number was 78, but the true death toll from bungee jumping could solely be blamed on the weather.
– We left the freezer door open, but only because Gerald’s hand wouldn’t fit with the rest of him, and ice cream is always better after it’s melted a little.
Haha…! I like that last one. It went from ‘oh, shit is serious’ to ‘well, ya know…’ in a second. And the voice is great.
She sent the cats out before dawn, so they could poke round the bins and infect people before breakfast.
Love anything with cats in it. I want to know what the infection is.
Give me a handful of Bulldog shit and I will open a portal to a world of terror.
“Statistically speaking, it doesn’t matter if you drank the blue one first.” she said.
Bees were the answer to her constant interruptions at the office.
If they’re killer bees we’re talking thriller/horror.
If they’re bumble bees we’re more into the comedy line of things.
Where we goin’?
Well, the new challenge is to pick a line from this challenge and write a story. So, where *you* goin’? 😉
Helen thought George over-eager but then he hadn’t had sex in over 300 years.
Life’s never quiet when you’re a mortician married to a banshee.
She’s the world’s most thrilling date, according to all the guys who survived.
Still four shopping days till Christmas and already nine department store Santas dead.
Love it!
He never stopped writing cursive but the characters in his text started to dip the older he got, as if leaning their ear to the ground, made thinner by the weight of time, the strain of days.
This is beautiful.
The girl was twiddling a scalpel about in her fingers, idly, as any other student deep in thought might do with a pencil.
Beware of The Twiddler!
He was beautiful, and he knew I wanted him.
While taking a shower that morning, the numbers embedded in John’s neck flashed red for the first time since his asshole boss installed them.
I once had a boss who talked about doing this but never had the follow through or electronics knowledge to carry it out.
In retrospect, I suppose he didn’t have to die.
Tia stared up at the violently flashes, frozen momentarily with a fear unlike anything she had ever felt before, its metallic taste filling her mouth and sweeping away all abilities to think or reason, and she barely had time to turn onto her side before vomiting helplessly onto the dry, scratchy grass of the field.
Mia stared up at the violent flashes, frozen momentarily with a fear unlike anything she had ever felt before, its metallic taste filling her mouth and sweeping away all abilities to think or reason, and she barely had time to turn onto her side before vomiting helplessly onto the dry, scratchy grass of the field.
The war has been over for months, they tell me, though nobody bothered to pass us that memo.
I ended up using this one. https://mxgomez.wordpress.com/2015/04/23/wars-end-a-chuck-wendig-challenge/