FIRST SENTENCE IN A NOVEL: This all began innocently, although I have been around long enough to be suspicious of what seems to be an innocuous telephone call like the one I received on a sunny June morning as I sat in the office with coffee after breakfast.
I've enjoyed this guy's novels, but this wasn't the way to start a book. It's TOO DAMN LONG! There are 43 words in that sentence.
He could have rewritten this into two or three sentences.
Rewrite: It was a sunny June morning, and I sat in the office drinking coffee after breakfast. Then the telephone rang, disturbing me.
I realize author Robert Goldsborough wouldn't like my version of his first sentence. I'm just writing the same information in a shorter form. It's 22 words, not 43.
The above sentence is from a Nero Wolfe book called Archie Goes Home.
I loved the book, just not the first sentence.
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