Its Friday! Let's Have Some Fun!

This is my first time participating in Follow Friday and I'm looking forward to meeting a few new bloggers!

To join the fun and make new book blogger friends, head on over to Parajunkee to get the rules and sign up!

The Book Blogger Hop is a place just for book bloggers and readers to connect and share our love of the written word!  This weekly Book Party is an awesome opportunity for book bloggers to connect with other book lovers, make new friends, support each other, and generally just share our love of books!  It will also give blog readers a chance to find other book blogs to read!  So, grab the logo, post about the Hop on your blog, head over to Crazy-For-Books and start HOPPING!

This week's question: What is the thing you like most about reading book blogs? Is it the reviews, author guest posts, articles, giveaways, or something else entirely?

The only reason I read book blogs is to find new books to read! Reviews and memes like Mailbox Monday and Teaser Tuesday have helped me find many books that I may not have found on my own. Life is too short to read bad books so I always do a little preliminary research before I add a book to my TBR list. The giveaways and author posts are fun extras!

Share the first lines of the book you are currently reading! Then, if you feel so moved, let us know what your first impressions were based on that first line, and let us know if you liked or did not like the sentence. Then link-up over at Katy's place, A Few More Pages, and see what everyone else is reading! Here's mine:

 

      Daddy said, "Let Mom go first."
     Mom wanted me to go first. I think it was because she was afraid that after they were contained and frozen, I'd walk away, return to life rather than consign myself to that cold, clear box. But Daddy insisted.



Pretty wild opening, huh? The rest of the first chapter was super intense and I couldn't stop reading. I'm not normally into sci-fi, but I just finished this book and I thought it was pretty awesome. Here's the teaser from the back cover: A story of love, murder, and madness aboard an enormous spaceship bound for the future.

Happy Friday everybody! Don't forget to check out my Twelve Days of Christmas Giveaway! Only three days left to enter to win the Kobo e-reader!

Book Beginnings: The Endless Forest

Book Beginnings on Friday is a meme hosted by Becky at Page Turners. Anyone can participate; just share the opening sentence of your current read, making sure that you include the title and author so others know what you're reading. If you like, share with everyone why you do, or do not, like the sentence.


I'm currently reading the final installment in Sara Donati's Wilderness series and this is how it starts:

Well now, look who's finally come round to call. Just yesterday I was wondering to Hannah if maybe you lost your way. But here you are, jumped right out my mind to stand in front of me.





These lines come from the first page of the book which is labeled "Prologue: A Word with Curiosity". This is a departure from the previous books as she's never used the first person POV or addressed the reader directly. But I like it, because this is the last book and Curiosity has been a reliable character, one who's always there, biding her time, chiming in with a wise word or a sharp rebuke to keep someone in their place. So it's comforting to start this way with her, an old friend; to know she's still around because she's getting very old, and to know that she's still got stories to tell.

Book Beginnings: Mockingjay

Book Beginnings on Friday is a meme hosted by Becky at Page Turners. Anyone can participate; just share the opening sentence of your current read, making sure that you include the title and author so others know what you're reading. If you like, share with everyone why you do, or do not, like the sentence.


I was blown away by Hunger Games and there was no such thing as middle-book-syndrome for Catching Fire which ended with one heck of a bang. I've been anxiously awaiting this third and final book and here's the first line:



I stare down at my shoes, watching as a fine layer of ash settles on the worn leather.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
I like this beginning because it is full of possibilities. That ash could come from anything - fire, cigarette, volcano, cremated remains, etc. And is the ash a good thing or a bad thing?
 
But mostly I like this beginning because I know what happened at the end of the last book and with this first line I know exactly where she is and why and I can't wait to read more!

Book Beginnings on Friday: The Count of Monte Cristo

Book Beginnings on Friday is a meme hosted by Becky at Page Turners. Anyone can participate; just share the opening sentence of your current read, making sure that you include the title and author so others know what you're reading. If you like, share with everyone why you do, or do not, like the sentence.


I've just started The Count of Monte Cristo, which I'm reading for the Oh La La French Historical reading challenge and Oh La La week on Royal Reviews:


On the 24th of February, 1815, the watch-tower of Notre-Dame de la Garde signalled the arrival of the three-master Pharaon, from Smyrna, Trieste, and Naples.

Nothing exciting or enticing about this opener, but at least it tells me when and where I am, and I appreciate that!

Friday Firsts: Wolf Hall

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.

How well did the author pull you into the story

with their first sentence?

"So now get up."

Felled, dazed, silent, he has fallen; knocked full length on the cobbles of the yard. His head turns sideways; his eyes are turned toward the gate, as if someone might arrive to help him out. One blow, properly placed, could kill him now.

I'd say that's a very effective opening. I'm in!

Friday Firsts is hosted by Well-Read Reviews.
Visit the site to share your current read!

Friday Firsts: The Boleyn Wife

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.

How well did the author pull you into the story

with their first sentence?

Overhead the sleek black ravens circle and caw, while below my window the workmen chat merrily, their voices hale and hearty as they call to one another above the din of hammer and saw. They brush the sawdust from their leather jerkins and woolen hose and go blithely about the business of building the scaffold upon which I shall soon die.


As far as first lines go, I think these are pretty good. They paint a picture, the movie is starting to roll in my head, and the narrator has dropped a bomb I can't ignore. Off to a promising start, I'd say.

Friday Firsts is hosted by Well-Read Reviews.

Visit the site to share your current read!

Friday Firsts: Outlaw

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.

How well did the author pull you into the story

with their first sentence?

 

"Hurry!" Megan ordered, her breath fogging in the frigid air as she leaned forward in the saddle. Her horse, a headstrong bay mare with an urge to nip, galloped through the forest as night closed in.





Front cover blurb says:  "He was tempted by the woman he swore to destroy" and the back cover says it's a:  "classic romance adventure set on the turbulent border of Wales, where a rogue knight and a lady clash with passionate intensity..."

I've read several of her other historical/fantasy/romances and really enjoyed them. I picked this one up at the library sale for 50 cents. The back cover sold me and the first line sucked me right in. I've gotta find out what she's running from...or to!

Friday Firsts is hosted by Well-Read Reviews.

Visit the site to share your current read!

Friday Firsts: Pope Joan

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.

How well did the author pull you into the story

with their first sentence?

It was the twenty-eighth day of Wintarmanoth in the year of our Lord 814, the harshest winter in living memory.

Brief and doesn't give much hint of what's to come, but it gives the state of things. I have been looking forward to reading this book and was thrilled to get it on Goodreads Swap for $3.58! After reading the first line I went ahead and finished the prologue. The POV character is a village midwife who battles through a blizzard to reach the home of the local canon, whose wife is in labor. The prologue was well written and at the end little Joan was born to a mother who might not survive and a devout father who blames women for sin and was disgusted to witness the birth of a daughter.

Should make for an interesting childhood for poor Joan.

Friday Firsts is hosted by Well-Read Reviews.

If you'd like to participate, visit the site for details.

Friday Firsts: Throne of Jade

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.

How well did the author pull you into the story

with their first sentence?

The day was unseasonably warm for November, but in some misguided deference to the Chinese embassy, the fire in the Admiralty boardroom had been heaped excessively high, and laurence was standing directly before it. He had dressed with especial care, in his best uniform, and all throughout the long and unbearable interview the lining of his thick bottle green broadcloth coat had been growing steadily more sodden with sweat.

This is the second book in the Temeraire series. (Read my review of the first, His Majesty's Dragon.) In that book, Laurence is captain of a British ship that takes a French ship in battle, and along with it, a mysterious dragon egg, which turns out to be a gift to Napoleon from the Chinese Emperor. So Laurence becomes an Aviator, a captain to the dragon Temeraire, and has a difficult time adjusting to the differences between the Aerial Corps and the Navy.

So this opening line tells me two things: Number One, Laurence is still a stickler for the strict decorum of naval life and is roasting because of it, and Number Two, the Chinese have come to claim their dragon. Will they triumph? Guess I'll have to read on!

Friday Firsts: Shadowbrook

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.

How well did the author pull you into the story

with their first sentence?

Miserere mei, Deus...Have mercy on me, Lord, according to the greatness of Your mercy.
 
The five women had no mercy on themselves.
 
They beat their backs with knotted cords. Each wore a black veil, pulled forward so it shadowed her face, and a thin gray robe called a night habit.
 
 
Hmmm...Not at all how I expected this novel to start, which the header on the back cover says is "A sweeping tale of love, ambition, and a war that ignited a revolution..." Guess I'll have to read on!
 

 

Friday Firsts is hosted by Well-Read Reviews.

If you'd like to join the fun, visit the site for details.

Friday Firsts: The Spymaster's Lady

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.

How well did the author pull you into the story
with their first sentence?

She was willing to die, of course, but she had not planned to do it so soon, or in such a prolongued and uncomfortable fashion, or at the hands of her own countrymen.






How can you not keep reading after a first line like this? I was already about 100 pages into another romance and planning on reading this one in a week or so, but I had to read the first page when it arrived and I just couldn't stop there. So far, so good!

Friday Firsts is hosted by Well-Read Reviews.

If you'd like to join the fun, visit the site for details.

Friday Firsts: Pendragon's Banner

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.
How well did the author pull you into the story
with their first sentence?

With an exhausted grunt of effort, Arthur, the Pendragon, raised his sword and with a deep intake of breath brought it down through the full force of weight and momentum into the skull of an Anglian thegn.

Hell yeah! That's my Arthur, the dirty rotten bastard. Always fighting something. Good to see he hasn't changed. I devoured the first book in this series over Christmas weekend. The Kingmaking: Book One of the Pendragon's Banner Trilogy. The last book I read in 2009 turned out to be one of the best. I can't wait to start this book tonight!

Friday Firsts is hosted by Well-Read Reviews.

If you'd like to join the fun, visit the site for details.

Friday Firsts: Lake in the Clouds

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.
How well did the author pull you into the story

with their first sentence?

In the spring of Elizabeth Middleton Bonner's thirty-eighth year, when she believed herself to be settled, secure and well beyond adventure, Selah Voyager came to Paradise.

While technically there's nothing wrong with this first line, and it does let me know right away that Elizabeth (the heroine of the first two novels in this series) is alive and well, still living in Paradise and about to embark on another adventure, this is what I would call a kind of "cop-out" first line. I didn't necessarily want to know all of that in the first line of the story. I think I would have liked to have had that information teased out a little bit over a few pages to re-acquaint myself with the character and draw me into her life again.

That being said, I've read the first ten chapters of this book and I've been sucked right into the story regardless of having so much divulged in the first line.

Friday Firsts is hosted by Well-Read Reviews.

If you'd like to join the fun, visit the site for details.

Friday Firsts: The Adventures of Alianore Audley

The first line can make or break a reader's interest.

How well did the author pull you into the story

with their first sentence?

I was ten years old in the 34th year of Mad King Harry the Sixth when Lady Tegolin came to my father at his castle of Newport and asked if she could take me as her pupil.

I don't think it's a particularly gripping line, but it does get the book right to the point by opening with the "inciting incident" in the first sentence. Must be interesting times living under the reign of a mad king, and if he's mentioned in the first line, will he be important to the story in some way? Unusual for a woman to have a pupil in the 15th century, I think? This must be the beginning of Alianore's adventures...

Friday Firsts is hosted by Well-Read Reviews.

If you'd like to join the fun, visit the site for details.