tra la la lally
Dec. 13th, 2007 12:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
truepennyIn the interests of pretending that I may, at some point in the future, ever do a lick of work again (and because ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
stillsostrange and cristalia are my bellwethers), here's that first-line meme.
NOVELS & NOVELLAS
1. Corambis
One by one we walked the labyrinth beneath Summerdown, and one by one we came to the engine, dark and cold, at its heart.
2. The Emperor of the Elflands
An urgent voice, a hand shaking roughly at his shoulder. "Maiah! Maiah, wake up!"
3. Cormorant Child
With a shriek of protesting metal, the hatch opened, and Mule fell out of the palace-ship into the long grass of the Edrin Valley. He was trying to run before he made it to his feet.
4. Sidhetown Tigers
Jefferson Finch was a lousy pitcher, but he was the best we had.
5. Dark Sister
Long ago, in a world none of them can remember, the vampires were taught to dance.
6. The Second Son
On the twenty-fourth of April, Medraut dreamed of Loheris again.
7. Schrödinger's Parable of the Cat
Denise Blumenthal died on a beautiful spring morning in the polity of Greater Manhattan.
8. The House at the End of the World
When Sebastian Marlin became a man, there was no one to celebrate with.
9. The White Devil
Since I was a little girl, I've always told my father my dreams. Except for one.
10. The Ghoul Hunters
They hadn't caught the shoggoth larva smugglers yet, but the head of the BPI's southeast hub had other things on his mind: "And, ah, how are you and Sharpton doing, Keller?"
11. [untitled]
The crime-scene tape was gone from the basketball court.
12. [untitled]
I was not born, but made--programmed, manufactured, assembled--and my earliest memories aren't memories at all, but data stored to ROM: who holds my patents, who wrote my code; who initiated my activation sequence; a warning that I was valuable government property; if found, please return to.
13. [untitled]
Ludovic Priest was under the dashboard of a '79 Comet when Skeeter sang out, "Bully lights!"
NOVELETTES & SHORT STORIES
KMB
14. "White Charles"
The crate arrived at the Parrington on a Wednesday, but it was Friday before anyone mentioned it to me.
15. "Thirdhop Scarp"
The current owner of Thirdhop Scarp claims that the name is a contraction of "third hope," but this is etymologically dubious in the extreme; still improbable but far more likely is the local explanation: that if you fall off the escarpment, you reach the bottom in three hops.
16. "The Replacement"
[no first line yet]
THE GHOUL HUNTERS
17. "The Brides of Nyarlathotep"
The Renault case refused to break. Snapshots of the victims had gone up on the corkboard in the briefing room, one by one, and most of the agents in the Bureau of Paranormal Investigations' southeast hub could recite their names by heart: Lydia Renault, age 27; Mary Anne Sumner, age 24; Dale Kelton, age 25; Joella Barber, age 24. And they were waiting, sick and helpless, for number five.
18. "Under Babylon"
Mick Sharpton's howl of outrage--"oh fuck no!"--was clearly audible in the junior agents' office. "Mickey-boy's just seen next week's duty roster," Livermore said smugly. "I told Adams he was going to screech like a scalded cat."
SEKRIT PROJECT
19. "Ballistic"
Cases reach the Shadow Unit by torturous paths.
MISC.
20. "The Queen of Liverpool"
The Mistral Freighter D35-692N-C, Queen of Liverpool, had been grounded for thirty years, since the successful implementation of Chen and Tiedemann's q-curve drive had made her and all her sisters obsolete. Her navigational systems had been pulled, all her fittings, and she had been deliberately crashed in the deserts outside New Prosper Colony, deserts so vast and so lifeless the colonists had never bothered to name them.
21. "(Un)fallen"
Vij hates being meat.
22. [untitled]
Wolves prowl the Sunset Strip. You can tell them by the way their eyes reflect the street lights. You don't get in their cars or follow them down alleys, no matter what they promise. You made that mistake once, and you know just how lucky you are that you came out alive, mostly in one piece, and not infected with anything worse than the clap.
Hollywood has taught you a whole new definition of "lucky."
23. "The Ninth Secret of the Tea Ritual"
My mother was kitsune. When I was born kitsune, too, she cursed the fates and slew the midwife and raised me as a daughter.
24. [untitled]
The woman in my office had been dead for five days when I found her. The smell was unbearable, but the ghost was worse.
25. [untitled]
"What are you doing, sister-wife?"
26. "The Queen in Winter"
There were five queens in the creche. Beulah, Pauline, Camille, Thelma, and Katrina. Beulah was the favorite, and one night after the nurses had gone to bed, the others ganged up on her. There were only four queens after that.
27. [untitled]
Queen Titania was dead.
28. [untitled]
The fight ended in a flurry of motion and a sudden spray of blood.
stillsostrange and cristalia are my bellwethers), here's that first-line meme.NOVELS & NOVELLAS
1. Corambis
One by one we walked the labyrinth beneath Summerdown, and one by one we came to the engine, dark and cold, at its heart.
2. The Emperor of the Elflands
An urgent voice, a hand shaking roughly at his shoulder. "Maiah! Maiah, wake up!"
3. Cormorant Child
With a shriek of protesting metal, the hatch opened, and Mule fell out of the palace-ship into the long grass of the Edrin Valley. He was trying to run before he made it to his feet.
4. Sidhetown Tigers
Jefferson Finch was a lousy pitcher, but he was the best we had.
5. Dark Sister
Long ago, in a world none of them can remember, the vampires were taught to dance.
6. The Second Son
On the twenty-fourth of April, Medraut dreamed of Loheris again.
7. Schrödinger's Parable of the Cat
Denise Blumenthal died on a beautiful spring morning in the polity of Greater Manhattan.
8. The House at the End of the World
When Sebastian Marlin became a man, there was no one to celebrate with.
9. The White Devil
Since I was a little girl, I've always told my father my dreams. Except for one.
10. The Ghoul Hunters
They hadn't caught the shoggoth larva smugglers yet, but the head of the BPI's southeast hub had other things on his mind: "And, ah, how are you and Sharpton doing, Keller?"
11. [untitled]
The crime-scene tape was gone from the basketball court.
12. [untitled]
I was not born, but made--programmed, manufactured, assembled--and my earliest memories aren't memories at all, but data stored to ROM: who holds my patents, who wrote my code; who initiated my activation sequence; a warning that I was valuable government property; if found, please return to.
13. [untitled]
Ludovic Priest was under the dashboard of a '79 Comet when Skeeter sang out, "Bully lights!"
NOVELETTES & SHORT STORIES
KMB
14. "White Charles"
The crate arrived at the Parrington on a Wednesday, but it was Friday before anyone mentioned it to me.
15. "Thirdhop Scarp"
The current owner of Thirdhop Scarp claims that the name is a contraction of "third hope," but this is etymologically dubious in the extreme; still improbable but far more likely is the local explanation: that if you fall off the escarpment, you reach the bottom in three hops.
16. "The Replacement"
[no first line yet]
THE GHOUL HUNTERS
17. "The Brides of Nyarlathotep"
The Renault case refused to break. Snapshots of the victims had gone up on the corkboard in the briefing room, one by one, and most of the agents in the Bureau of Paranormal Investigations' southeast hub could recite their names by heart: Lydia Renault, age 27; Mary Anne Sumner, age 24; Dale Kelton, age 25; Joella Barber, age 24. And they were waiting, sick and helpless, for number five.
18. "Under Babylon"
Mick Sharpton's howl of outrage--"oh fuck no!"--was clearly audible in the junior agents' office. "Mickey-boy's just seen next week's duty roster," Livermore said smugly. "I told Adams he was going to screech like a scalded cat."
SEKRIT PROJECT
19. "Ballistic"
Cases reach the Shadow Unit by torturous paths.
MISC.
20. "The Queen of Liverpool"
The Mistral Freighter D35-692N-C, Queen of Liverpool, had been grounded for thirty years, since the successful implementation of Chen and Tiedemann's q-curve drive had made her and all her sisters obsolete. Her navigational systems had been pulled, all her fittings, and she had been deliberately crashed in the deserts outside New Prosper Colony, deserts so vast and so lifeless the colonists had never bothered to name them.
21. "(Un)fallen"
Vij hates being meat.
22. [untitled]
Wolves prowl the Sunset Strip. You can tell them by the way their eyes reflect the street lights. You don't get in their cars or follow them down alleys, no matter what they promise. You made that mistake once, and you know just how lucky you are that you came out alive, mostly in one piece, and not infected with anything worse than the clap.
Hollywood has taught you a whole new definition of "lucky."
23. "The Ninth Secret of the Tea Ritual"
My mother was kitsune. When I was born kitsune, too, she cursed the fates and slew the midwife and raised me as a daughter.
24. [untitled]
The woman in my office had been dead for five days when I found her. The smell was unbearable, but the ghost was worse.
25. [untitled]
"What are you doing, sister-wife?"
26. "The Queen in Winter"
There were five queens in the creche. Beulah, Pauline, Camille, Thelma, and Katrina. Beulah was the favorite, and one night after the nurses had gone to bed, the others ganged up on her. There were only four queens after that.
27. [untitled]
Queen Titania was dead.
28. [untitled]
The fight ended in a flurry of motion and a sudden spray of blood.
