First Lines Friday is a weekly feature for book lovers created 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? Here’s how to join in:

• 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!

I’ve been away from home for various reasons for the past several Fridays… but now I’m back, and ready for a FLF post!

This week’s lines are from the July new release that I’ve just started:

Is it possible to want something so much that the force of your longing pulls taut the fabric of reality until it bursts? Our father had imagined the end of the world so often that, for a while, he believed that he summoned it.

So what’s the book?

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Not With A Bang by Temi Oh
Release date: July 14, 2026
352 pages

Synopsis:

Station Eleven meets Leave the World Behind in this family drama at the end of the world about a crumbling household’s attempts to find their way back to each other amidst a cataclysmic event.

“Our father had imagined the end of the world so often that, for a while, he believed that he summoned it.”

The Minton family is in crisis. After losing his job, Marcus begins stockpiling cans, running evacuation drills and digging a doomsday bunker in the back garden. At the same time, his daughters are unravelling in their own ways – Chantale is being haunted by dreams of disaster, and Briar’s obsession with a missing classmate draws her deeper into the seductive world of a UFO cult. Meanwhile, no one is aware of the diagnosis their mother has been trying to keep hidden.

When, on the morning of the eldest daughter’s wedding, an extinction-level event tears the world apart, the Mintons must fight their way through a devastated city—back to safety, survival, and each other.

I enjoyed this author’s 2019 novel, Do You Dream of Terra-Two?, and I’m excited to be starting this new release.

Does this sound like something you’d enjoy?

Happy Friday! Wishing everyone a great weekend!