First Lines Quiz

Check out the answers to last week’s Presidential Censorship Quiz.

Here’s how to play…Identify the first lines of these famous novels by telling me what book it’s from.  Leave a comment with the # of the first line and the title of the book and I’ll cross it off the list.  No Googling, that’s cheating and no fun!  

As a hint here are the authors you’ll find quoted here – Moore. London, Hurston, Crace, Jackson, Eugenides, Gilbert, McCullers, Hoffman, Gaiman, Hoeg, Sedaris, Frazier, Fforde, Nabokov, Steinbeck, Smith, Tolstoy, Leonard, Alcott

1. When the teacher asked if she might visit my mother, I touched my nose eight times to the surface of my desk. NAKED by DAVID SEDARIS

2. In the town, there were two mutes and they were always together.  THE HEART IS A LONELY HUNTER BY CARSON MCCULLERS

3. In a country such as Amerika, there is bound to be a hell-of-a-lot of food lying around just waiting to be ripped off.  STEAL THIS BOOK by ABBIE HOFFMAN

4. At the first gesture of morning, flies began stirring.  COLD MOUNTAIN by CHARLES FRAZIER

5. “Christmas won’t be Christmas without any presents,” grumbled Jo, lying on the rug. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott – Beth F

6. Christmas crept into Pine Cove like a creeping Christmas thing: dragging garland, ribbon, and sleigh bells, oozing eggnog, reeking of pine, and threatening festive doom.  The Stupidest Angel by Christopher Moore – Tiny Librarian

7.No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream.  THE HAUNTING OF HILL HOUSE BY SHIRLEY JACKSON

8. When Fat Charlie’s dad named something, it stuck.  Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman, Thoughts of Joy

9. Buck did not read the newspapers, or he would have known that trouble was brewing, not alone for himself, but for every tidewater dog, strong of muscle and with warm, long hair, from Puget Sound to San Diego.  THE CALL OF THE WILD by JACK LONDON

10. It’s freezing-and extraordinary 0 degree Fahrenheit-and it’s snowing, and in the language that is no longer mine, the snow is qanik-big, almost weightless crystals falling in clumps and covering the ground with a layer of pulverized white frost.  SMILLA”S SENSE OF SNOW by PETER HOEG

11. I write this sitting in the kitchen sink. Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith – Fleurfisher

12. Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.  Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy- Calila

13. When Chili first came to Miami Beach twelve years ago they were having one of their off-and-on cold winters: thirty-four degrees the day he met Tommy Carlo for lunch at Vesuvio’s on South Collins and had his leather jacket ripped off.  GET SHORTY by ELMORE LEONARD

14. On the morning  the last Lisbon daughter took her turn at suicide-it was Mary this time, and sleeping pills, like Therese-the two paramedics arrived at the house knowing exactly where the knife drawer was, and the gas oven, and the beam in the basement from which it was possible to tie a rope. – The Virgin Suicides (Wanda) by JEFFREY EUGENIDES

15. Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.  THEIR EYES WERE WATCHING GOD BY ZORA NEALE HURSTON

16. Going to Ford’s Theatre to watch a play in like going to Hooters for the food.  EAT ,LOVE ,PRAY by ELIZABETH GILBERT

17. My father had a face that could stop a clock.  The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde – Fleurfisher

18. To the red country and part of the gray country of Oklahoma, the last rains came gently, and they did not cut the scarred earth.  Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck – Calila

19. She was Lo, plain Lo, in the morning, standing four feet ten in one sock.  Lolita by Vladimir – Candice

20. For old time’s sake, the doctors of zoology had driven out of town that Tuesday afternoon to make a final visit to the singing salt dunes at Baritone Bay.  BEING DEAD by JIM CRACE

I found all of these lines in 1001 Books for every Mood and I”ll be reviewing it on Wednesday.

16 thoughts on “First Lines Quiz

  1. fleurfisher says:

    #11 I Capture The Castle by Dodie Smith

    One of my favourite books ever!

    This one got added to my wish list after reading 1001 Books for every Mood.

  2. Bumbles says:

    DAMMIT! All that time I spent reading Tolstoy and Calila beat me to it. And Beth for Alcott while we’re at it. I haven’t read any of the other authors. But I’m guessing Sedaris is #17 and #15 sounds like something Nabokov might write. London might be #10. But I don’t know the novels.

    You need to get here early for the easier ones (although I don’t think many of these are easy) 😉

  3. candice says:

    #19, one of my favorite books…Lolita (Nabakov). the man loves language, he uses it with such care. the rest of that paragraph is truly inspired!

    Lolita is the only Nabokov novel I’ve read, but it’s one of my all-time favorites.

  4. candice says:

    also, is #6 holidays on ice, by david sedaris? sounds like him. and I love #10, which sounds a bit like Lorrie Moore, but I only know birds of america, is that it?

    Another Sedaris miss. And the Moore listed is Christopher Moore, not Lorrie. It’s fun guessing right?

  5. fleurfisher says:

    I’m thinking that #17 sounds like Jasper Fforde. Not sure which book, but as it’s first in the series I’ll go with The Etre Affair.

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