Can someone point me to some style guides somewhere on this issue? Let's say you have a list of three issues and you want to introduce the list and give the three issues. Is it better to put the "intro sentence" as its own paragraph (Version 1 below) or as the first sentence of the first paragraph (Version 2 below).
I tend to think that, strictly speaking, it should be its own paragraph, but it seems more flowing and less mannered to simply elide from that into the first point. This is for writing for general non-fiction, somewhere north of middlebrow level.
Version 1
There are three reasons why wallabies are cute.
First, they are fluffy. We all know how cute that is. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
Second, they are kind of rounded--how cute is that? Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
Finally, their name is "wallaby". Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
Version 2
There are three reasons why wallabies are cute. First, they are fluffy. We all know how cute that is. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
Second, they are kind of rounded--how cute is that? Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.
Finally, their name is "wallaby". Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua.