The ability to write the worse beginning sentence to a novel is the intent of the contest, but some are just well, good, smile even if they would never, never, ever, in a million years work in an actual novel. ----- Original Message ----- From: Kim Friedman To: bksvol-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxx Sent: Sunday, July 05, 2009 6:09 AM Subject: [bksvol-discuss] Re: My favorite Bulwer-Lytton sentence Oh, Carrie, that is such a howler. I'm not fond of that either. Did you actually scream about it? I don't know whether to admire the writer for his ingenuity in coming up with the thing or to throw hard objects at him. I wonder if he is really a good writer deliberately setting out to write badly here. Regards, Kim aka Ellinder. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ From: bksvol-discuss-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:bksvol-discuss-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carrie Karnos Sent: Saturday, July 04, 2009 7:23 PM To: Bookshare Vol Group Subject: [bksvol-discuss] My favorite Bulwer-Lytton sentence About halfway through this sentence, I start screaming, "Make it stop! Make it stop!" For me, this is THE worst opening line ever: She wasn't really my type, a hard-looking but untalented reporter from the local cat box liner, but the first second that the third-rate representative of the fourth estate cracked open a new fifth of old Scotch, my sixth sense said seventh heaven was as close as an eighth note from Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, so, nervous as a tenth grader drowning in eleventh-hour cramming for a physics exam, I swept her into my longing arms, and, humming "The Twelfth of Never," I got lucky on Friday the thirteenth. --Wm. W. "Buddy" Ocheltree, Port Townsend, Washington (1993 Winner) See what I mean?? Carrie