18 Books With the Best First Lines in Fiction

From Penguin:
"'First sentences are doors to worlds,' wrote Ursula Le Guin in her essay The Fisherwoman's Daughter. Which is to say: in the hands of our greatest writers, opening lines cast an immediate spell, grab your attention like a starter's gun, set the tone and even foreshadow what is to come. Here, we've picked 18 of our favourite opening lines in fiction. It's not exhaustive – there are far too many exquisite openers in literature to make space for them all – but these are some we find hard to forget."