Which Great Line Would Make You Read the Book?

Have you gone through your to-be-read (TBR) pile yet? Or do you look at your TBRs and find nothing that interests you right now? Here’s a collection of lines from various speculative fiction novels. Which great line would make you read the book?

Image of an open book with a pirate, pirate chest and boat springing to life from the pages-- a great line would make you read the book

Anthology

“I have no mouth. And I must scream…”

― Harlan Ellison, I Have No Mouth and I MustScream

Cyberpunk

“Bees? Are you telling me we have space bees?”

― David Colello, Trillion Dollar Sky: Mission Cerex

Horror

“Jane woke, stretched, and decided to kill herself. If she hadn’t found a reason to live by the end of the day, she would jump from the rig. It felt good to have a plan.”

― Adam Baker, Outpost

Science Fiction

Beware of more powerful weapons. They often inflict as much damage to your soul as they do to you enemies.

― Greg Cox, The Rise and Fall of Khan Noonien Singh

“There was no escaping the screaming rats.”

― Jim L. Owens, The Neptune Bubble

I am a leg of the death tripod that will destroy our foes.

― Frank Herbert, Dune

“Damn it, no horizon should bend upward.”

Jan S. Gephardt, What’s Bred in the Bone

“What was I before the war? It’s hard to remember that far back. But I think maybe I was human.”

 A.J. Vega, Majesty’s Offspring

“What lies beyond the wormhole … is the devil incarnate.”

― Chris Burton, Alpha One: The Jump Pilot

When a Blood Wolf has its teeth out, it doesn’t take much to make it snap.

― Maura Milan, Ignite the Stars

Survival Stories

“Bellamy had come down from scanning the heavens only to find himself in the depths of hell.”

― Kass Morgan, The 100

Time Travel

The universe had just been upended. All of the pieces and places, the people and the particles, slid off a grand checkerboard and crashed into the ground, scattershot.

― M.K. Williams, The Infinite-Infinite

“The day they went to Chichén Itzá started no differently than any other day on vacation, yet Tony Solomon felt a numbing unease, the kind that sometimes came on when something bad was going to happen.

Jennette  Marie Powell, Time’s Enemy

Never tell a computer to forget it.

― Larry Niven, A World Out of Time

Epic Fantasy

“Nian hated climbing this mountain.”

Deleyna Marr, Dominion of Darkness

Post-Apocalyptic

Freedom begins with one act of courage.

― J.O. Young, Freaks Episode 6 Uncaged

Paranormal Urban Fantasy

“I had evolved a year too soon, and it nearly broke me”

― Carlyle Labuschagne, The Broken Destiny

Note

There are no affiliate links in this post. These quotes caught my attention. I thought maybe they’d catch yours too. If you’d like more reading recommendations check out my Going to Mars Word-by-Word book reviews and my own books, My Soul to Keep and Fellowship.

Happy Reading

I hope there’s at least one quote that intrigued you. Would you share which great line would make you read the book? If none of these do, please share one of your favorite lines from a book you’ve read.

4 comments

  1. Almost all of these would interest me! I think I’m most drawn to Outpost, probably because it focuses on the character. And wow, thanks for featuring my book! It has some pretty impressive company…

    1. Yay! Glad these were interesting to you, Jennette. Oh, yes–the line from Outpost is intriguing. And, your book has an intriguing line as well. I was happy to include it.

  2. What a fun post! You really have a way of picking intriguing lines. And what was equally fascinating was you picked lines I didn’t remember from books I had read like Dune and World Out of Time.

    1. Thank you, Terry! I’m glad you enjoyed the post. And yes, I chose lesser known quotes from most of the books. That was the fun part of writing this one.

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