Mystery Novel First Lines

Whether you're scanning a novel at a book store or checking the first few pages online, it's the beginning words (the hook) that are enticing.  One of my favorite authors who inserts lots of zingers in his writing is Nelson DeMille. His opening lines always grab you.

Here are a few links to opening lines of popular novels. Is there a favorite you want to add?
Thriller First Lines
Opening Lines
Diagram of Famous Lines
Best Opening Lines
First Lines from Famous Novels

How to Murder a Millionaire by Nancy Martin

I read a blog review of Nancy Martin's No Way to Kill a Lady (Cozy Mystery Blog) which is number 8 in the Blackbird Sisters Mystery Series and was intrigued. However, I prefer to read a series in sequence so ordered How to Murder a Millionaire which is the first book. I expected it to be more of a chic lit book based on the cover picture, but it turned out to be a great mystery with perhaps a little chic lit thrown in. This is an author I will be reading more of this year.

How to Murder a Millionaire - From the back cover:
My parents blew the country for a sunny resort that catered to American tax evaders, leaving the family art collection to my sister Emma and the furniture to my sister Libby. They gave me the land - and a property tax bill for two million dollars. Which is why I, Nora Blackbird, a former socialite who never really held a job in all my thirty-one years, found myself in dire need of a paycheck . . .

Nora takes us with her into the Philadelphia houses of the elite, throws in some historical information on her way and with her we rub shoulders with characters both good and disreputable. In the midst of the mystery Nora also deals with the love/hate relationship she has with her two sisters.

I found this book at the library and it was dog-eared with a very creased spine - always a good sign that a book has been well read.

Other Books in the series:

List from Cozy Mystery Blog

Nancy MartinBLACKBIRD SISTERS MYSTERY Series: Main Characters: Libby, Emma, & Nora Blackbird, Destitute Sisters 

1. How to Murder a Millionaire    ''02
2. Dead Girls Don’t Wear Diamonds   '3
3. Some Like it Lethal    '04
4. Cross Your Heart and Hope to Die     '05
5. Have Your Cake and Kill Him Too     '06
6. A Crazy Little Thing Called Death    '07
7. Murder Melts in Your Mouth     '08
8. No Way to Kill a Lady    '12

Heat Wave - Richard Castle

 From the cover:
A New York real estate tycoon plunges to his death on a Manhattan sidewalk. A trophy wife with a past survives a narrow escape from a brazen attack. Mobsters and moguls with no shortage of reasons to kill trot out thir alibis. . .

If you love the series Castle on ABC, you will enjoy this book by "author" Richard Castle. Although at times I thought it sounded more like a screenplay than a novel, it's easy to picture Rick Castle (Nathan Fillion) as Rook the journalist and Kate Becket (Stana Katic) as Detective Heat. Definitely a fun mystery read and at under 200 pages you will zip through it in no time. I don't know who actually wrote the book but I wonder if it's the writers from the TV show. Fun idea.

Everywhere That Mary Went

I recently watched Lisa Scottoline on the television show, Murder by the Book, and liked her approach to researching true crimes for her novels. I picked up her first book, Everywhere That Mary Went.

Who can you trust when Everyone you know is a lawyer?

Mary DiNunzio has been slaving away to make partner in her cutthroat Philadelphia law firm. . . Mary can't shake the sensation that someone is watching her. The shadowboxing turns deadly when her worst fears are realized.

Along with her fears of being stalked, are the dynamics of the DiNunzio family - Mary's loss of a close relationship with her twin sister and all the drama that goes along with being Italian/Catholic.

Lisa Scottoline did a great job at building tension and keeping the reader guessing. I was not disappointed. As a trial lawyer, she has inside knowledge of working for a large law firm and was not shy in acquainting the reader with all that goes on in the inner sanctum. I did find the present tense narrative a little distracting though and wonder if all her novels are written this way.