TTT - Favorite Beginnings/Endings in Books

Top Ten Tuesday is a meme created by The Broke and the Bookish. 

Each week a new topic is given and weeks topic is:

Top Ten Favorite Beginnings/Endings In Books

This is really hard for me because my memory isn’t that specific. I have a hard time picking out scenes from books and placing them in order. I only really retain the general tone and feel of a book if it isn’t one of my favourites. It took me quite a while to get all ten!

1. Feed by Mira Grant – The first scene of Feed involves a motorcycle, a stick, a throng of zombies, and an impressive feat of gravity. What is there not to like?

2. TheMiseducation of Cameron Post by Emily Danforth – “The afternoon my parents died, I was out shoplifting with Irene Klauson.” Such a lovely, simple first sentence. It certainly caught my attention.

3. HowMy Summer Went Up in Flames by Jennifer Salvato Doktorski – “I wasn’t always the kind of girl who wakes up on the first day of summer vacation to find herself on the receiving end of a temporary restraining order.” I didn’t really like this book, but it did have a very attention-grabbing opening line.

4. Like Mandarin by Kirsten Hubbard – “The winds in Washokey make people go crazy. At least, that’s what everybody says. Our part of Wyoming is plagued by winds: hot winds, cold winds, dry winds, wildwinds. Wildwinds are the worst. Not only do they torment us from the outside, but they also seem to bluster inside us: battering around in our lungs, whistling through our capillaries. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of that wind blew into the passageways of our brains.” Isn’t that beautiful? It takes skill to make wind and Wyoming that fascinating. It’s so compelling and lyrical.

5. Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier – “Lightning has struck me all my life. Just once was it real. I shouldn’t remember it, for I was little more than a baby. But I do remember.” Don’t you want to keep reading?? I know I do! I haven’t actually read Remarkable Creatures yet, but if the opening couple of lines are any indication of what’s to come, I’m very excited to.

   

6. Zoe Letting Go by Nora Price – The ending of this book killed me. I don’t remember when exactly it occurred, but the revelation of what exactly happened to Elise (though not a surprise) coupled with Zoe’s reaction to it broke my heart. It was incredibly emotional.

7. Teeth by Hannah Moskowitz – The last scene made me cry in public. On the bus. In the middle of the day. I was not anticipating that ending whatsoever and it was the epitome of bittersweet.

 8. Noughts and Crosses by Malorie Blackman – I’m not going to say what the scene is because that would ruin it for anyone who hasn’t read it, but it’s incredibly powerful.

9. Second Chance Summer by Morgan Matson – It’s not the very end of the book, if I remember correctly, but the meteor shower scene and the one immediately following it make me teary eyed just thinking about them. I called my dad sobbing right after I finished the book to tell him how much I love him.

10. The Storyteller by Antonia Michaelis – “Blood. There is blood everywhere. On his hands, on her hands, on his shirt, on his face, on the tiles, on the small rounds carpet. The carpet used to be blue; it never will be blue again.” “And the snow that fell onto the roof in winter… it fell softly… softly… and it covered the house, the armchair, the books, the children’s voices. It covered Anna and Abel, covered their parallel world, and everything was, finally, very, very quiet.” The first and last paragraphs of this book aren’t as beautiful out of context, but they still evoke tons of feelings in me. I’m so impressed with this book. Not only is it a translation from German to English, it is hugely underrated. It’s one of my absolute all-time favourite YA novels. I had to take a three day break from reading just to get over this book. Just to process this book. JUST GO READ IT NOW!