Getting past the back cover...

I will have to admit - I just don't get a chance to frequent book stores like I used to do (or still want to do). Sadly, vendors aren't open during my middle-of-the-night free hours. Ahhh, the days of getting lost in the aisles for hours. For the sake of this blog, let's all "go there" together...

You are perusing the shelves of your favorite bookstore, looking for something new to read. Passing the piles of "best sellers" and into the land of the now obscure, you search. Maybe its the color that catches your eye or a title that lures you closer? Pulling the book from its shelf, you flip it over and read the back. Unfortunately, there are only reviews of how wonderful the book is, but little to nothing about the story inside. The first inside flap is only about the author. Still willing to give it a chance, you decide to turn to the first chapter and read, at least, the first paragraph before returning it to its resting place.

If you are anything like me, this is the deal maker or breaker - what I read on that first page will either make me flip further or put it back. Dull or slow beginnings just aren't palatable. If I am immediately pulled into the novel, I will probably opt to buy it. (If I sink to the floor to read more, forgoing all concerns for cleanliness, I will definitely be buying it!)

The preference of getting sucked into a story is most likely why I love to read and write prologues. Stealing a scene that is, most likely, set somewhere in the middle or even end of the book, I place them at the beginning. I have to ask myself, would I be captivated by the first paragraph of the first chapter (or prologue) of my own story or would I put it back on a shelf to collect dust?
For example:

           Owen Everett was a handsome man. Evie had thought so from their first accidental meeting at the college bakery. They married the week after graduation, too excited to wait any longer to begin their life together. His parents raised the objections of their age and the one-year relationship, but Owen and Evie were confident of their chosen path. 

Bla bla bla bla. Sorry, shelving this one…

OR
      
       Tears blurred the forest's trees and bushes as she ran through them with all the speed her weary legs could offer. Thorns scraped flesh from her limbs and went as unnoticed as the evening's dropping temperature. Only when her feet would move her no further and the thundering in her chest threatened explosion did she stop. Shaking, she gasped for air and screamed into the deserted woods. "No!"

Hm…this one may have some potential. Who is "she" and what or who is she running from in the woods?

You already know which book I might be buying, but which story-starting paragraph would cause you to consider carrying it up to the cashier?