Getting the last word in

This book cover by textile artist Celia Birtwell reminds me of my friend Sarah's family house near Sligo, Ireland. I sat at her paned-window with drawn-back curtain and painted watercolors of Ben Bulben.

But that's for another post, another day.

Today I want to bookend my previous post about great first lines by posting some great last lines. The editors at American Book Review chose 100 Best Last Lines as they did First Lines.

Why is the last line of any import? It is the farewell, and it should be bittersweet.

I'm going to list a few from the Review editors, and as last time I will put the rank they gave it, the line in italics and then the author and title.

#1: ...you must go on, I can't go on, I'll go on.

Samuel Beckett, The Unnamable

#2: Who knows but that, on the lower frequencies, I speak for you?

Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man

#3: So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

#5: But I reckon I got to light out for the territory ahead of the rest, because Aunt Sally she's going to adopt me and sivilize me and I can't stand it. I been there before.

Mark Twain, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

#41: I lingered round them, under the benign sky; watched the moths fluttering among the heath, and hare-bells; listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass; and wondered how anyone could ever imagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth.

Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights

To me, these endings leave a lot to imagination. There are futures in them. I want to add a few more that weren't on the Review list. These come from challenged books I loved reading; for more on what challenged books are check out Banned Books Week. Among these is one I've always thought was one of the best endings I'd ever read:

So Lyra and her daemon turned away from the world they were born in, and looked toward the sun, and walked into the sky.

Philip Pullman, The Golden Compass

But they never learned what it was that Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Who, and Mrs Which had to do, for there was a gust of wind, and they were gone.

Madeleine L'Engle, A Wrinkle in Time

Behind him, across vast distances of space and time, from the place he had left, he thought he heard music too. But perhaps it was only an echo.

Lois Lowry, The Giver

Whether this is my end or a new beginning I have no way of knowing: I have given myself over into the hands of strangers, because it can't be helped. And so I step up, into the darkness within; or else the light.

Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale

Interestingly, the Review chose a final line from The Handmaid's Tale but from the section called Historical Notes after the main story ends. It is: Are there any questions?

How do you feel about the above as ending lines? Do you have one that stuck to you long after you closed the book?

The launching pad

Every novel starts somewhere. The author's job is to snag readers with that opening and keep them captivated.

Those first lines should be enticing or arresting. They should evoke the tone of the book, be compatible with the theme and storyline.

In reading through the 100 Best First Lines chosen by the editors of the American Book Review, I picked a few that got my attention. And, by the way, this still being Banned Books Week, a number of these amazing books also make those lists. Go figure.

I considered making this a quiz with the book title and author at the bottom of the post or in the comments section, but, hey, you probably don't want to work that hard. You can test yourself by trying to guess before reading the identity. I'm putting the lines in italics to set them off from the rest of the post and giving the number of where they fell in the 100 Best First Line list.

#3: A screaming comes across the sky.

My immediate reaction to "a screaming," rather than "a scream" and to it coming from "across" the sky is WHAT? WHY? So I'm hooked. The book is Gravity's Rainbow by Thomas Pynchon.

#8: It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.

Thirteen. Need anything more? This one is 1984, George Orwell.

#15: The sun shone, having no alternative, on nothing new.

I love me some ennui. Gotta be Samuel Beckett, Murphy.

#16: If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.

Um, do I need to tell you? The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger.

#21: Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed.

After this, of course, you may be lost. Ulysses, James Joyce.

#26: 124 was spiteful. Full of a baby's venom.

Spooky, much? Beloved, Toni Morrison.

#38: All this happened, more or less.

A little time shift, anyone? Slaughterhouse-Five, Kurt Vonnegut.

#39: They shoot the white girl first.

Oh, boy. This is a loaded sentence that drags the reader in, despite misgivings. Yes, it's going to be tough and probably brilliant. Paradise, Toni Morrison.

#52: We started dying before the snow, and like the snow, we continued to fall.

Bleak, but beautiful, somehow. I kept reading when I found it years ago. Tracks by Louise Erdrich.

#53: It was a pleasure to burn.

Many of you may know this iconic first line from Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451.

#65: You better not never tell nobody but God.

This is going to be intense, and I want to know why. The Color Purple, Alice Walker.

#96: Time is not a line but a dimension, like the dimension of space.

A chewy thought that you know is going to be explored. Margaret Atwood, Cat's Eye.

#97: He--for there could be no doubt of his sex, though the fashion of the time did something to disguise it--was in the act of slicing at the head of a Moor which swung from the rafters.

Say what? Gotta know more of this strange tale. Orlando, Virginia Woolf

Think your first line has got what it takes? You can share it in the comments section or just drool about the above. I'd love to hear any thoughts on this subject.