Steal.jpg (400×522) Chuckchuck.jpg (637×414) 100 best first lines from novels. Following is a list of the 100 best first lines from novels, as decided by the American Book Review, a nonprofit journal published at the Unit for Contemporary Literature at Illinois State University: 1. Call me Ishmael. - Herman Melville, Moby-Dick (1851) The Best 100 Opening Lines From Books / Life / Stylist Magazine. One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. "Which road do ..... - Lewis Carroll.