Best memoir opening lines

An Autobiography of Our Galaxy

Moiya McTier

This is a bracing nonfiction book with one (significant) fictional detail: It’s narrated by the Milky Way. That’s right! The Milky Way is here to tell you her life story.

She talks about her birth 13 billion years ago. She divulges how she gets along with her neighbors — the galaxies we call Andromeda Sagittarius — which she tore to pieces a few hundred million years ago. She muses about how she makes stars; turns out, it’s in batches and probably faster than you might think. She introduces us to dark matter and the enormous black hole at the galaxy’s center that she calls Sarge.

Would it surprise you to learn that the Milky Way has a strong personality? She’s imperious and a bit haughty — like a slightly younger version of Dame Maggie Smith’s character in Downton Abbey. She seems to like us humans, but mainly as a diversion. (The author Moiya McTier said that when she wrote lines for the Milky Way, she i Autobiography format!