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?

• 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!

Lines

Then why are you here?”

“Depends what you mean,” Rebus said.

“Mean?” The woman frowned behind her glasses.

“Mean by ‘here,’ ” he explained. “Here in this room? Here in this career? Here on the planet?”

She smiled. Her name was Andrea Thomson. She wasn’t a doctor — she’d made that clear at their first meeting. Nor was she a “shrink” or a “therapist.” “Career Analysis” was what it had said on Rebus’s daily sheet.

2:30–3:15: Career Analysis, Rm 3.16.

With Ms. Thomson. Which had become Andrea at the moment of introduction. Which was yesterday, Tuesday. A “get to know” session, she’d called it.

She was in her late thirties, short and large-hipped. Her hair was a thick mop of blond with some darker streaks showing through. Her teeth were slightly oversized. She was self-employed, didn’t work for the police full-time.

“Do any of us?” Rebus had asked yesterday. She’d looked a bit puzzled. “I mean, do any of us work full-time . . . that’s why we’re here, isn’t it?” He’d waved a hand in the direction of the closed door. “We’re not pulling our weight. We need a smack on the wrists.”

“Is that what you think you need, Detective Inspector?”

He’d wagged a finger. “Keep calling me that and I’ll keep calling you ‘Doc.’ ”

“I’m not a doctor,” she’d said. “Nor am I a shrink, a therapist, or any other word you’ve probably been thinking in connection with me.”

“Then what are you?”

“I deal with Career Analysis.”

Cover

  Goodreads

Alex