First Lines (1)

For some silly and thoroughly bloggerish reason I've decided it might be fun to post the first line of each new book I start reading, and (maybe) in the end the last line. Just this weekend I started reading Neal Stephenson's Quicksilver, a rousingly fun and erudite historical novel (though I found it in the scifi section at the bookstore). It's first line:

Enoch rounds the corner just as the executioner raises the noose above the woman's head.

Well, that certainly gets my attention!