It’s Nov. 1, and that can only mean one thing: After shaking off their candy hangovers, thousands of aspiring authors around the world are going to embark upon National Novel Writing Month, or #NaNoWriMo—an internet-organized exercise in which people challenge themselves to finish a complete draft of some book-length fiction between now and Dec. 1.
What many of those authors realize (and just as many don’t) is that writing a novel is pretty hard; even Faulkner typically needed a six-week bender to crank out something like The Sound and the Fury. First drafts are often bad, so even the manuscripts that go on to be published will need lots of revision. Every year, though, Weird Twitter revels in the knowledge that countless shitty, unsalvageable opening lines will be written on this date, and to that end, they are inspired to offer their own. And they rule.
Here are the hilariously bad openers from novels we’d actually read:
"Wait! You forgot your lunch!" I shouted to my son Bulbahuman, a human-Bulbasaur hybrid. "Bulbasaur!" added his mother #NaNoWriMoOpeners
— drewtoothpaste.bsky.social (@drewtoothpaste) November 1, 2016
#NaNoWriMoOpeners "It's not easy being a detective," thought John Dog, a detective who is possibly a dog, I haven't thought this through
— pixelatedboat aka “mr tweets” (@pixelatedboat) November 1, 2016
Trump chuckled. "You mean the Pussy Emeralds?" #NaNoWriMoOpeners
— crisp mattman (@cushbomb) November 1, 2016
https://twitter.com/DougExeter/status/793469650377936896
https://twitter.com/tholzerman/status/793490032761987072
https://twitter.com/pattymo/status/793463273001742340
https://twitter.com/untitled_demo/status/793505600436965376
https://twitter.com/Mickey_McCauley/status/793504576489914368
Wolverine, lion in winter, looked down gruffly/tenderly at the market-tested daughter-proxy who would soon change his life #NaNoWriMoOpeners
— Gretchen Felker-Martin (@scumbelievable) November 1, 2016
"I'm horny as hell, must be a side effect of the pregnancy," Waluigi muttered. The baby bowser inside him shifted. #NaNoWriMoOpeners
— cool guy with good opinions (@rasputinmethod) November 1, 2016
https://twitter.com/JohnPaulGreen/status/793492159802388480
https://twitter.com/kerboflatscreen/status/793494217859280899
https://twitter.com/boring_as_heck/status/793484368471740420
"Reece's… For BREAKFAST?" He bellowed.
— Vasily Goose (@toddlergarage) November 1, 2016
"You can't have candy for breakfast!"
He pressed the detonator of his suicide vest…#NaNoWriMoOpeners
https://twitter.com/aaronwphillips/status/793492776356835328
https://twitter.com/important_celeb/status/793470679635128321
Zack knelt down at the grave and wept. As he wiped the tears from his eyes, he vowed revenge. "I'll fix this, Mr. Belding" #NaNoWriMoOpeners
— Mike Beauvais (@MikeBeauvais) November 1, 2016
https://twitter.com/MikeOdenthal/status/793464986051960833
https://twitter.com/joellugar/status/793506987166367744
— Virgil Texas (@virgiltexas) September 6, 2016
https://twitter.com/_Pinback/status/793501654716780544
#NaNoWriMoOpeners
— geoffrey gauchet (@animatedGeoff) October 31, 2016
“Haha, wow, sorry I haven’t posted in a while! I’m going to try to post every day, or at least once a week”
I gasp, as he pours his cream into my gaping hole. He brings me to his lips and sucks me dry, eliciting a moan. I am a cup #NaNoWriMoOpeners
— Lucas "The Drgn" Broadwing (@LucasTheDrgn) November 1, 2016
https://twitter.com/TheHallWay1/status/793504008275103744
https://twitter.com/tondog/status/793438270692532224
https://twitter.com/enveloping/status/793513302215098368
https://twitter.com/IridiumRE/status/793071903363784704
Heartening to know that good literature isn’t dead. Even if it has its critics.
I'm sorry, but I just don't understand #NaNoWriMoOpeners. Are they real or satire? Or just real bad writing? 😣😣😣
— Saadia Faruqi (@SaadiaFaruqi) November 1, 2016
All of the above, Saadia. All of the above.