Short Hair
Sorry, right now the first two paragraphs of my book are the best. Unless something changes, I'm not putting them out in public.
Under World. It rocks!
Responsible adult
Always a Hero: "Things began like they always do: With a false sense of security."
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
watching down on us
Actually, that's the first line to the preface of the new Exile, penned by the translator.
Feels clunky.
edited 31st Aug '11 7:53:19 PM by annebeeche
Banned entirely for telling FE that he was being rude and not contributing to the discussion. I shall watch down from the goon heavens.
"Carter walked down the darkening street, watching the puffs of cold air spiral away from her mouth."
This is a vast improvement upon my original first sentence: "It was cold."
Maid of Win
You should know that I'm a lover, not a fighter—but in a pinch, I can hold my own. And frankly, I get in a lot of pinches.
Son of Secrets: The Golden Arrow
edited 31st Aug '11 7:53:51 PM by Ronka87
Thanks for the all fish!
watching down on us
![[up]](https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/smiles/arrow_up.png "[up]"){kind=icon}
"walked" is a naked word. You should consider clothing it with a more descriptive synonym.
edited 31st Aug '11 7:54:10 PM by annebeeche
Banned entirely for telling FE that he was being rude and not contributing to the discussion. I shall watch down from the goon heavens.
Which parts? I have three.
The opening narration just prior to the prologue:
The actual opening paragraph(s) to the prologue itself:
Gunfire erupted along the empty streets of Rio Azúl in Mat’s direction. Minovski particle bolts rained in their direction lighting up the evening air with a light blue glow. Sergeant Mathias “Mat” Watkins and Sergeant Tenchi Yamanaka together ran for the cover of a wrecked car on the left side of the street the second the incoming fire died down for a second. Corporal Daniel stayed behind holding the streetcorner the three came from. Mat and Tenchi having reached the relative safety of the wrecked car, aimed their M-3 assault rifles down the street as they fired a quick six shot burst each at the Preyaran Lancers defending the street corner. The opposing Lancers scattered from their positions, running for cover from the incoming fire by the two Terrans. However this only gave pause for a moment and then the Lancers returned fire again.
And then the opening to Chapter Zero: (Why Zero? Why not?)
It was a warm summer day in the year 2455 in the city of San Francisco. A good thing too as Mathias Watkins and his sister Samantha made their way to the local park. An inseparable pair, Mat was the older who at seven years old seemed typical for his age. He stood four feet tall with fair yet lightly tanned skin and having a matching set of brown hair and brown eyes. He wore a pair of brown jeans coupled with a white t-shirt, both of which were visibly worn. Samantha on the other hand stood only three feet, three inches with blond hair and blue eyes and had only just turned five. In comparison she wore a short light pink dress not too dissimilar in style to old school uniforms from long ago. The two of them lived together under the custody of the local child services but frequently found themselves out with Mose, their long time friend since shortly after Samantha was born. Mose was not your typical friend a seven year old might have, what with being a fully grown thirty two year old man with brown eyes and brown hair. However, Mose was as genuine a friend as they could find in the system, supporting them any way he could despite the fact he frequently had to make trips out of town for up to weeks at a time. But at the park itself, none of that mattered anymore for the three for today.
"In the middle of a jungle, under a thick canopy obscuring a starless, alien sky, sat a woman."
Yes, my writing style errs towards beige, but it's easier to add description than slash through Purple Prose when it's grown out of control.
edited 31st Aug '11 8:04:39 PM by KillerClowns
Maid of Win
Tom: I was mainly thinking of the first thing a reader would see, but it's all cool. 
Anne: Yeah, I probably should. See, I just wrote the beginning of this draft about half an hour ago and haven't gone back over it yet.
watching down on us
Oh, okay.
Banned entirely for telling FE that he was being rude and not contributing to the discussion. I shall watch down from the goon heavens.
The future of warfare in UC.
A Numbered Existence: I will get out of here, Father. The cell was many things, but it was not cold. It was metal, small, featureless, perhaps even dank for brief time when the environmentals had malfunctioned. But it was not cold.
Night Life is pretty brief: "Stop the truck!"
"It's another three and a half bloc-"
"Stop the goddamn truck!"
Nous restons ici.
Author in waiting
Sword & Shield
There was no sound quite like a troll’s roar, Egil decided. He held tightly to his mother’s hand as they ran through the night, only memory guiding their way. His uncle ran behind, an old sword in one hand. All around, the forest rang with cries, some human, most not. Others ran alongside them in the dark, terror and makeshift weapons their only defense.
edited 31st Aug '11 8:58:28 PM by TheEmeraldDragon
I am a nobody. Nobody is perfect. Therefore, I am perfect.
Manifestation Files:
I'm not sure if this is the best way to start it though. A Chekhov's Gun is hidden in it, but...
edited 31st Aug '11 8:58:28 PM by chihuahua0
Professional Writer & Amateur Scholar
One of my scrapped ones:
As I start my high school year, I had a many qustions in my mind. However, the most important and urgent one would be, "Why is my hair on fire?"
I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.
Mine?
Our dragon protagonist, incidentally, proceeds to have a dream about but completely missed the point of Neon Evangelion Genesis (Yes, that is a Shout-Out).
Support Taleworlds!
Sorry, that's not the gun. It's the Brazil part. I may find a way to sneak a Byzantium Manifestation in somewhere in the series, then it's now a gun.
edited 31st Aug '11 9:07:10 PM by chihuahua0
The first panel and everything in it, I think.
edited 31st Aug '11 9:07:52 PM by ArgeusthePaladin
Support Taleworlds!
PARTY PARTY PARTY I WANNA HAVE A PARTY
A bit too sword and sorcery for my tastes, but good otherwise.
And mine (Warning: It is quite long):
“I’ll ask you one more time, barkeep. Is this man here Thousand-Trigger?” Jerome’s confused and hurt brain barely registered a word, right up until “Thousand-Trigger”. The bar’s dim bare-bulbs flickered on and off like the lights upstairs. He’d heard that name before.
“Well Craig, looks like you fucked it up again. You’re supposed to knock some sense into him, not knock him senseless! But I suppose the distinction would only be clear to someone who didn’t crawl outta their mama ass-backwards.” This came from the man farthest back, the one in the poncho and zoot suit. Craig, by the sound of it, was the dumb muscle of the pair. Not that you could tell. He was scrawny, thin as a board. A stark contrast to the gun the kid was carrying. The barrel alone was as long as a man’s hand. And every single inch was bearing down on the drunkard head-down on the bar, the one they’d accused of being Thousand Trigger.
Maelstrom
"In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I've been turning over in my mind ever since. 'Whenever you feel like criticizing any one,' he told me, 'just remember that all the people in this world haven’t had the advantages that you’ve had.'"
Waitaminute...
Cool Winds: "The subway system was a mass grave, with trains running like ghosts through the perpetually dark tunnels, their scant lights illuminating prowling mobs of scavengers."
I write pretty good fanfiction, sometimes.
Fuzzy Orange Doomsayer
Come to think of it, maybe I should ask whether this disclaimer works:
That was a story I got stuck on partway through, though I intend to return to it after I deal with some other stuff. There's also a story that I'm waiting to get proofread, for which I have a proper beginning:
The high-pitched voice that answered him was somewhat stilted, as if English weren't the speaker's native language. "Well, I was. I said we'd have to get here early to get good seats." Deep blue eyes checked a nonexistent wristwatch, making an exaggerated display. "I must have been waiting ten minutes. And you look kind of cute. Sit down."
(Incidentally, neither of those is the story I'm supposed to be working on for the writing contest. Nor is either the story I was working on last, since I spent a month waiting to get the second story proofread before I gave up and switched readers. As soon as I've got the second story up, I'll quit work on my current story and start on the contest entry instead.)
edited 1st Sep '11 3:13:57 AM by feotakahari
That's Feo . . . He's a disgusting, mysoginistic, paedophilic asshat who moonlights as a shitty writer—Something Awful
Go away.
The Girl The Sea Didn't Swallow
"Listen up, preach. I will literally crush your ass into a cube if you don't scurry the fuck off to whatever rock you skittered out under from right this instant. Don't believe me? I can do it. I can make you square. I have thirty pounds of good miracle lettuce hidden under this coat, it's five million fucking degrees out, and, frankly, I wasn't in much of a mood to begin with."
Threatening men of the cloth. I'm not proud of it, but sometimes they just don't leave me a choice.
(That's the opening of this graphic novel/webcomic to be I'm writing. Guess which bit is dialogue and which bit is narration and win a shiny nickel.)
edited 1st Sep '11 4:29:22 AM by MisterAlways
Always touching and looking. Piss off.
Banned, selectively
Pardon the all-caps, but that's the way it was originally written, to be part of a comic strip to introduce a tongue-in-cheek RPG.
CHAOS ERUPTED IN THE SUPERMARKET AS THE HOODS OPENED UP. THE UZI CREATED A SEA OF OATS OUT OF THE CHERIOS DISPLAY WHILE THE MAC-11 SENT BITS OF COLE SLAW FLYING FROM THE CABBAGE RACK. THE GROCERY CLERK TOOK A STRAY BLAST FROM THE FULL CHOKE 12 GUAGE RIGHT ON THE DIAL, TURNING HIS HEAD AND ARM FULL OF VEGETABLES INTO A SPRAY OF HEMOGLOBIN SALSA. AS JOHN GLANCED DOWN , HE NOTICED THAT THE CONTOURS OF HER RIPE MELONS WERE PULLED TIGHT AGAINST THE SCANT COVERING OF THE SHOPPING BAG.
SECRET AGENT JOHN BONDAGE ASSESSED THE SITUATION. THINGS WEREN'T LOOKING THAT BAD. HE HAD THE GIRL, HALF A DECK OF SMOKES AND TWO MAGS FOR HIS DESERT EAGLE NIFTY FIFTY. WITH A LITTLE LUCK, THEY WOULD STILL MAKE THEIR RESERVATIONS FOR LOBSTER AT SEVEN.
Whether you think you can, or you think you can't, you are probably right.
Inspired by this episode
of Writing Excuses. Let's share the opening lines/paragraphs of our current project(s), so they may be judged with outstanding cruelty.
Except scratch the last part. :D Ok, go!
Thanks for the all fish!