Here’s the scenario: tiptoeing through grandma’s dining room you discover a delicious cake on the table. You must taste that icing. You look around. No one’s watching. A dollop of that lip-smacking frosting hits your tongue faster than darkness disappears in daylight. After snitching a sample, you cannot wait to get your fork into a full slice. The anticipation is insurmountable.
Been there. Done that. Got the t-shirt, right?
So, it goes with the opening lines of a good book. If they are good, you must know what happens. Thus, you turn page after page.
With that in mind, I offer the opening lines of a handful of novels set in Kentucky, or about characters or by authors from the Bluegrass.
Consider these morsels akin to sampling the icing on grandma’s cake.
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“Today they hanged Ellison Mounts. He was a half-wit and his people are dirt-poor and simple, but he didn’t deserve to die. I know it and some others do, too.” – The Coffin Quilt by Ann Rinaldi.
This brilliant novel for junior high students, set in Kentucky, pertains to the 19th century feud between the Hatfields and McCoys as seen through the eyes of Fanny, a young woman in the McCoy family.
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“It wasn’t easy simultaneously mending six billion broken hearts, but I managed. That is the first line of the book I am going to write someday.” – The Anomalies by Joey Goebel.
In small-town Kentucky, five outsiders join forces. Included in this eclectic group are: a precocious child; an 80-year-old woman who favors cowboy boots and a Sex-Pistols tee-shirt; a wheelchair-bound beauty; a young Iraqi searching for an American soldier he hurt in the First Gulf War; and an extremely articulate African American coping with a drug problem. Music’s their passion; The Anomalies is their name. Their vision: conquer the world with music. Alone they are outsiders. As a group, they are mesmerizing.
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“‘Another girl? Not another girl? Don’t tell me I’ve got another daughter!’ These are the first words my father spoke after I was born.” – Keeper of the Doves by Betsy Byars.
Set in our state at the turn-of-the-century, this novel for upper-level grammar school grades portrays a girl’s emerging awareness about her place in her family and the world, and how she comes to understand the tremendous power of words regarding good and bad.
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“The long howl of a wolf rolls over me like a tooth ache. Higher up shots ring out, the echoes stretching away till they are not quite heard but more remembered.” – Sweeping Up Glass by Carolyn Wall.
In this magnificent selection, Olivia Harker Cross owns a strip of mountain in Pope County. This is a community where whites and blacks “eke out a living in separate, tattered kingdoms and where silver-faced wolves howl in the night.” Someone is killing the wolves on Big Foley Mountain and Olivia wants to know who it is. She also investigates her tumultuous history (including her mom’s insanity), tries to reconcile her daughter’s flight to California, struggles to raise the son her daughter abandoned, and faces fears and very dangerous enemies.
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“This definitely qualified as a gray, ugly October morning in Lewiston, Idaho. Cold, clammy air seemed to drip from low hanging clouds that swirled into hints of winter bluster to come.” – Killing the Curse by Dennis Hetzel with Rick Robinson.
The Chicago Cubs have not won a World Series in more than a century. As all Cub fans know, they have not played in one since 1945. Now the beloved Cubbies are close to winning the Fall Classic for the first time since 1908. Will the curses of the past haunt them? Will bad luck continue to chase them? Will they win the World Series? You must read to find out.
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There you have the dollops, the opening lines from five novels worthy of a beverage and a cozy chair. To savor the full slices, you must read the books. You could discover wonderful new insights.
Donald Then, a novelist and experienced editor and journalist, is NKyTribune’s literary editor. He reviews books written by local authors or those with a Northern Kentucky setting. Reach him at author@djamesthen.com. Visit his website at www.djamesthen.com.