Worst Opening Lines!!

The winners of the annual Bulwer-Lytton Contest were just announced. Entrants competed to compose the very worst opening sentence for an imaginary novel. Its name comes from Victorian novelist Edward George Bulwer-Lytton who wrote "It was a dark and stormy night" as the first line of one of his books.

See http://www.bulwer-lytton.com/2011.htm for all the winners, but here are some of my favorites this year:

"Wearily approaching the murder scene of Jeannie and Quentin Rose and needing to determine if this was the handiwork of the Scented Strangler--who had a twisted affinity for spraying his victims with his signature raspberry cologne--or that of a copycat, burnt-out insomniac Sonny Kirkland was sure of one thing: he'd have to stop and smell the Roses."

"Within the smoking ruins of Keister Castle, Princess Gwendolyn stared in horror at the limp form of the loyal Centaur who died defending her very honor: "You may force me to wed," she cried at the leering and victorious Goblin King, "but you'll never be half the man he was."

"Detective Kodiak plucked a single hair from the bearskin rug and at once understood the grisly nature of the crime: it had been a ferocious act, a real honey, the sort of thing that could polarize a community, so he padded quietly out the back to avoid a cub reporter waiting in the den."

Groan loudly and enjoy!