I have often thought that the best first sentence in a novel is in The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger.
If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth. (3)
Prior to reading Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro (which I wrote about here), I thought the best last sentence was in the published version of A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway (though, from what I understand, there are lots of unpublished endings, but I will have to look that up later).
After a while I went out and left the hospital and walked back to the hotel in the rain. (332).
Now I think that sentence is tied for my favorite with the last one from Never Let Me Go (though, arguably, it is exactly the same in feeling and intent, if not the explicit words or preceding story).
I just waited a bit, then turned back to the car, to drive off to wherever it was I was supposed to be. (288)
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