So Matt Pallamary gives “The last camel died at dawn” as an example of a first sentence that does a metric shitload of work, and I'm still reeling.  

I mean, look at it.  Six words, and we know at least this much:

Camels live in the desert, therefore our setting is the desert.  It's the last, so there were at one time more of them.  One or more camels have already died.  Since this *is* the first sentence, these camels must have been damned important, and the conditions the camels and the humans associated with them are in must be dire.  We are in *somebody's* POV, and that somebody was around to see it die, and they are, in a word, fucked.

That is one damn good first sentence.

For what it's worth, I can't actually attribute it as a first sentence –  the nearest I've found is The Last Camel Died At Noon, by Elizabeth Peters.  I have no idea whether or not it's actually the first sentence of the book.  I also may have written it down wrong during the workshop.  

The inherent lesson remains.

This is on my mind.  I have this story I need to send out at the end of the week and frankly my first sentence sucks.  I'm working on it.  I will probably never acheive Camel Status but I'm going to apply myself to the problem.