Publishing Hub: What would you do with a book whose first line read, "I'm dead!"

Chinelo

Probably put it down if you’re looking forward to something great like a date, a shopping spree or a new job.

John

I’d be intrigued, assuming the book involves the spirits of dead people.

Chinelo

I come and stand at every door
But no one hears my silent tread
I knock and yet remain unseen
For I am dead, for I am dead
-Nazim Hikmet Ran.

I cried.

Kellie

Personally I would be intrigued. The opening of “I am dead” would entice me to read on to see how they died and where they are now.

Peter

That beginning is like the opening of Moby Dick … ‘Call me Ishmael.’ It sucks you straight in. If it were to follow the Moby Dick example, you would only learn details about the death in the last line. The journey to that last line would have to be pretty tortuous.

Leila

I probably wouldn’t read it because the opening sentence is so short. This is why something like “The Lovely Bones” is better. More personal. Reading that, the inner teenager in me would probably go “Yeah, and what mate? We all have problems.” I’d rather read something with a sentence that drew you in by using the character’s daily routine, like the first line of “Jane Eyre”. It’s equivalent to interpellation into a film through using a moving object, like opening in the interior of a car travelling somewhere. You immediately want to know where the car/character is going.

Anna

The Lovely Bones has a fantastic opening – I like to get straight into a story and get quite impatient if it is too cryptic or surreal sometimes. Not sure about the ’I’m Dead!’ line to begin with. It would need a bit of explaining to draw me in.

Chris

“So what”. That’s what the little kid who shot me said. After all, I am only a squirrel. But, you know what, it’s not like he needed me dead…like, for food. I’ve seen his house. He has plenty of food. I just hope he doesn’t find my children.

Ross

That’s lovely, Chris. It’s charming, yet tragic… Beautiful…

Chinelo

Very intriguing. You sound like a Pharoah…

Leila

I have this squirrel I sometimes see on my daily walks. I named it Cairo for some bizarre reason and he/it always seems to be an omen of emerging love affairs… laughs.

Jane

You been reading my books? I started one with exactly that line… :)

Paul

As a high school English teacher I regularly have to tell teenagers not to end their stories with “and then I died”. One little darling changed that to “and then I was blown limb from limb and my guts spread across the floor”. I think this dead narrator is too much the cliche to be effective. But then I thought that ’The Lovely Bones ’ was contrived to make things easier for the author. It never suspended my disbelief.

Leila

I think the dumbing down aspect is something which is par for the course with the trend of cinematic writing, which is perhaps something to do with one of my pet hates: “the MTV attention span”. *sigh. I think we would all prefer to be interpolated by interesting characters. Unfortunately at that age the “and then I died” cliché is just too easy. You may want to point that writer to some hard boiled 30’s pulp fiction though!

Failing that, it is pertinent to state that in fairytales the bad elements always meet a gruesome end since it’s symbolic of psychic growth. The casting out of a figure which has been imbued with all the negative id traits of the protagonist is a common device. But I don’t wish to teach the teacher, for fear of offending. :) I would probably suggest for the sake of a twist something like Chris’ squirrel thing. The viewpoints of an inaninate object would also be interesting. But anyway, if that was just a vent, vent away!

Paul

Venting accomplished. I feel much better for that now. Still wouldn’t want to read a book that starts ’I’m dead’ though :)

Leila

Me neither. So to whoever posted this opener, sorry. Aim not to shock a reader into reading, rather… lead them in. ;) And keep writing!

Harry

Assume it was ghost written…

Mary

As for me, it’s a nice caption, I’ll pick it up to read details.