On Openings

I just returned from Barnes and Noble, and I have discovered my new favorite opening line, from a Steampunk novel called The Friday Society, by Adrienne Kress:
"And then there was an explosion."
First off, this is a great use of in media res. Explosions don't happen on a daily basis in many places, so you start with a question of what the hell is going on.
Then it continues:
"It was loud. It was bright. It was very explosion-y."
That bit sets the tone for the rest of the story (or at least, for the page and a half that I have read) - for what I have read so far of The Friday Society, the 3rd person narrator is rather sarcastic and witty, and keeps up a similar narration to what has just been displayed, even if it only involves the development of the focus character, who caused the explosion (it wasn't on purpose, but... she's a lab assistant in a Steampunk universe; explosions are bound to happen).

A good opening, my friends, is more important than a good closing.  Why?  If you don't have a good opening, your readers are never going to make it to the end, so you will never know whether the readers will celebrate a good end to a good book, or complain of a terrible end to a decent book.  They're not even going to make it to the middle bits, even if the middle bits are of a higher caliber than the ending or the beginning.  Though it is important to develop every part of your writing, and to edit (which, unfortunately, I have displayed a severe lack in the writing of this blog), open your book well.

character interactions and books

While in our local coffee shop today, a friend of mine found a book.  I don't remember what it was called, but it had this kind of sweet inscription in it from the author to a friend, dated 10/30/92 - it was something about how the author wanted missed the recipient and hoped one day they could see each other again (and how maybe the profits could get the friend a one-way ticket to where the author lived).  But there was also a post-it note in the book, saying something along the lines of, "read this, and then leave it somewhere for someone new to find it."

There's a story behind this, and I hope someone can find out what it is.  As for my friends and me, we bounced around the idea of having a journal or book to pass around during breaks (or even during the school year), and then leaving the last five or ten pages blank and leaving it in a coffee shop for someone to stumble across and have a little look into our lives and our voices.
Well, we decided maybe not a journal, because one of our friends is blind, so he couldn't exactly read the journal or write it, because none of the rest of us could read or write Braille.  We did, however, decide to start a Vlog - a video blog.  We all have nicknames that kind of reflect what we want to do with our lives.  For example, my roommate is Physicist, because my roommate is a physics major.  Another friend is Editor, a third friend is Writer, and the blind friend is Composer, because he's a singer/ songwriter, which is kind of cool.  We might bring in more friends, but the five of us were the only ones of our friends in the coffee shop today.
Though I love writing, I'm still undecided about what I want to do with my career, so I'm Wild Card.  I have a lot of things I'm interested in, and though I want to pursue writing, I know that is liable to change.  I might wind up as a business major to sell my knit goods.  I don't know.

But the point is, all of this was inspired by an inscription in a book, and a post-it note therein.  Though it's not a fantasy hook by any means, this is still a plot hook that could go a long way in any genre (except maybe cyberpunk or futuristic dystopian fiction where print books no longer exist).
So my challenge for you today is this:
Your plot hook is a dedication in a book, written by hand in hurried ink, saying how the author misses the recipient.  Where do you take the story from there, and what is the story behind it?