This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic (hosted by The Broke and the Bookish) focuses on favorite book beginnings and endings, and I’m focusing specifically on my favorite beginning and ending lines. Let me warn you though, I think the lines for a couple of the endings are kind of spoilery if you haven’t read the book. This week’s list is in no particular order:
1. Beginning: The Book Thief
A startling opening line from our narrator from The Book Thief, Death.
2. Ending: Crime and Punishment
This was such a hard, and often times depressing, book to read, so I was quite thrilled when it had a very hopeful ending where, while Raskolinkov is paying for his crime, the woman he loves has promised to wait for him and he is a better man.
3. Beginning: The Beekeeper’s Apprentice
Nearly steps on Sherlock Holmes while reading? Definitely an intriguing start!
4. Ending: The Hunger Games
If I could have, I would have shared that entire thought process Katniss goes through as Peeta hands her flowers and makes it clear he wants them to be an item in real life. “I want to tell him he’s not being fair. That we were strangers. That I did what it took to stay alive, to keep us both alive in that arena…” Man this ending broke my heart in so many ways as I was so rooting for Peeta, and it made me want to pick up Catching Fire right away!
5. Beginning: The Scorpio Races
This is next on my TBR, but I read the first little bit as a preview before buying the book, and this opening line definitely caught my attention.
6. Ending: Catching Fire
This was a bit shocking… and again, made me ready to start Mockingjay! (So glad I didn’t read these books until all three were out…)
7. Beginning: The Giver
I wasn’t really sure what to expect when I first started The Giver, and for some reason this beginning stood out to me. Why was Jonas afraid now? Why had the aircraft from the year before frightened him so much? I was instantly interested in Jonas’ world and his story.
8. Ending: Mockingjay
I’m not counting the epilogue, which while I don’t actively dislike it, I just felt like was really out of place. But the last page of Mockingjay (before the epilogue) literally made everything in the the entire series worth it for me. After everything, Katniss finally found some security.
9. Beginning: Rebecca
Instantly intriguing. What is Manderley?
10. Ending: The Book Thief
The Book Thief begins strong and ends strong, while remaining intriguing throughout most of the book. Basically, you need to read it.
What are your favorite beginning and ending lines from a book?