House of Leaves (Book)

[Calis]

Anyone read this?

What a fascinating book. I just picked it up last weekend because my local B&N didn't have the 5th Patrick O'Brian book in, so I had to take a breather from the series.

This is quite a breath of fresh air though, I guess you would call it "progressive" fiction. The style is somewhat akin to Pale Fire by Nabokov.

Lets see if I can explain how it works at all. The book is mostly a critique of a documentary made called the Navidson Project, which was to be about a family moving into a new house and how they acclimate to it and such. Of course things turn a bit sour, and the house begins to take on a life of it's own, growing larger on the inside than the outside, and I'm sure much more happens later(I'm only a few chapters in.) Ok, so got that much?

Well the critique was never published, it was found upon the writer's by death by Johnny Truant, who adds another layer by the story by being the one who put the book together out of the critique and adds his own layer of LENGTHY footnotes to it, that veer off to tell a completley different story about his life and the feeling of alienation, and borderline insanity.

Furthermore, this is the "2nd" edition of the book, with a new set of editors who added some notes of their own to the writing.

Ok, enough of the summary though. It's an extremely well written book and it reminds me a lot of Chuck Pahlaniuk and a bit of Nabokov in the style. It's a lot easier to follow than my summary of it, and just an all around interesting book. It's printed in two colors, with house always printed in blue, and a few other things as well. It's also not just normal reading, it has a large amount of appendices, copies of letters, pictures, etc...

It's by no means your normal book. It's built a whole false history for itself. I'm not sure what genre I'd classify it in, it's a horror book in some respects, and it's also an excellent satire on the literary world, and how ridiculous critiques and analysis can be. It's both creepy and hilarious.

Great book so far though, and I hope it continues to be so. Anyone else read this? Thoughts?

Anyway, I just wanted to give out this recommendation to anyone who was looking for something new and different. I know I'm doing it no justic through my explanation, but read through the Amazon reviews and other places and I'm sure some folks will do a better job explaining what it's all about.

House of Leaves

[sachmo71]

The author is the brother of Poe. I love her.

[Calis]

You know, I saw her site advertised on the book, and haven't checked it out yet. Will do so now.

[Calis]

Hmm, so I do a search for Poe on Amazon and up pops a guide for Best CD's for the Homosexual Male.

Take from that what you will.

EDIT: Forgot my Dola

[sachmo71]

LOL!