An author named Molly Ringle has won the 2010 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, which awards the worst opening sentence of an imaginary novel every year. We can see why what she wrote is bad, but is it that bad?

The winning sentence is:

For the first month of Ricardo and Felicity's affair, they greeted one another at every stolen rendezvous with a kiss - a lengthy, ravenous kiss, Ricardo lapping and sucking at Felicity's mouth as if she were a giant cage-mounted water bottle and he were the world's thirstiest gerbil.

That is pretty bad! What with the gerbil analogy and the word "rendezvous." Why, it sounds like a sentence some Gawker writer might use in a television recap! So it's definitely bad. But is it the worst? I kind of wish this award was given to opening sentences of actual, extant novels. But alas, it is not. Can you think of a worse one from this year? Can you write a worse one? Fun pre-Fourth commenting activity, guys!

[EW]