First Lines Fridays is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if, instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines?

The Rules:

• Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page.
• Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first.
• Finally… reveal the book!

First Lines:

“This wasn’t the first time Daniel Braithwaite had found me going through someone’s trash. And to be honest, we both knew it wouldn’t be the last. I heard him coming, though, whistling that same old nameless tune that sometimes echoed in my dreams.”

This one is actually my current read, and I found myself with a lot of questions just from the first three lines of this book. There was no way I was going to stop reading, because I needed to know why she was going through the trash, why this was a habit, and why the tune he’s whistling pops up in her dreams!

Do you recognize the lines?

Here’s a hint:

It’s an upcoming historical fantasy that touches on an important aspect of history that I never knew about.

Still not sure? Here’s another hint:

It’s written by Leslye Penelope.

The First Lines Friday book is:

Daughter of the Merciful Deep.

About the Book:

• Title: Daughter of the Merciful Deep
• Author: Leslye Penelope
• Page Length: 384 pages
• Publication Date: June 4, 2024
• Publisher: Redhook

Synopsis:

A woman journeys into a submerged world of gods and myth to save her home, in this powerful historical fantasy that shines a light on the drowned Black towns of the American South.

“Our home began, as all things do, with a wish.”

Jane Edwards hasn’t spoken since she was eleven years old, when armed riders expelled her family from their hometown along with every other Black resident. Now, twelve years later, she’s found a haven in the all-Black town of Awenasa. But the construction of a dam promises to wash away her home under the waters of the new lake.

Jane will do anything to save the community that has sheltered her. So when a man with uncanny abilities arrives in town asking strange questions, she wonders if he might be the key. But as the stranger hints at gods and ancestral magic, Jane is captivated by a bigger mystery. She knows this man. Only the last time she saw him, he was dead—his body laid to rest in a rushing river.

Who is the stranger and what is he really doing in Awenasa? To find those answers, Jane will journey into a sunken world, a land of capricious gods and unsung myths, of salvation and dreams made real. But the flood waters are rising. To gain the miracle she desires, Jane will have to find her voice again and finally face the trauma of the past.

Links: Goodreads     

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