House of Leaves - Mark Z. Danielewski
Be prepared to be confused, angry, and heart broken. But...mostly confused. House of Leaves is an incredibly dense, heavy book, and not just in page count. The story is...a story...within a story...within a manuscript...within a documentary. Did you follow that? Good I didn't either. Don't go in expecting an old ghost tale or something spooky. Go in expecting...actually don't go in expecting anything. Let the book speak for itself. Let it consume you as it so heavily consumed our unreliable narrator. Be ready to not read this in public because (and I think this is half the fun) you will be literally twisting the book upside down, sideways, backwards and forwards, re-reading pages, skipping forward, skipping back, and struggling to read the swirling tiny print at the bottom of the page. This book is not a simple have a cup of tea and read. It's something you must engage with, something you must struggle to get through. When I said it was dense I meant it was DENSE. The story is as twisty as the words are, and every page turned is a leap from one perspective to the next, from one persons story to another. Were given manuscripts, journal pieces, letters, recordings, plays, every type of writing you'd like to read is present in this book.
Now, I can see where this book may not be for everyone. There is SO much thinking and confusion within this book that at some points it just ceases to be fun for some people, and they slap it away on their bookshelf to collect dust. But trust me, STICK WITH IT. Struggle with it, TRY it. The story in of itself is amazing, it's exciting, it's terrifying and depressing and hopeful all at the same time. You cheer as much as you rage as much as you cry. You want these characters to succeed but by the middle of the book you don't know what you want them to succeed AT because their goals are so convoluted you don't know where you're going. This book is disturbing at points, so disturbing I had to put it down for a while just to collect myself. It isn't SCARY. There are no mass murderers jumping out at you from the dark. But it's DISTURBING in that you'll want to sleep with your lights on, and walk-in closets will never look the same. Please. Try this book. And when you fail. Try again. And when you succeed. Do it again. Keep reading, keep twisting keep turning keep trying to understand. Because once you do, once you finally get it and finally understand everything this book is trying to tell you, you won't want to stop.
House of Leaves earns 5/5 stars from me.
Be prepared to be confused, angry, and heart broken. But...mostly confused. House of Leaves is an incredibly dense, heavy book, and not just in page count. The story is...a story...within a story...within a manuscript...within a documentary. Did you follow that? Good I didn't either. Don't go in expecting an old ghost tale or something spooky. Go in expecting...actually don't go in expecting anything. Let the book speak for itself. Let it consume you as it so heavily consumed our unreliable narrator. Be ready to not read this in public because (and I think this is half the fun) you will be literally twisting the book upside down, sideways, backwards and forwards, re-reading pages, skipping forward, skipping back, and struggling to read the swirling tiny print at the bottom of the page. This book is not a simple have a cup of tea and read. It's something you must engage with, something you must struggle to get through. When I said it was dense I meant it was DENSE. The story is as twisty as the words are, and every page turned is a leap from one perspective to the next, from one persons story to another. Were given manuscripts, journal pieces, letters, recordings, plays, every type of writing you'd like to read is present in this book.
Now, I can see where this book may not be for everyone. There is SO much thinking and confusion within this book that at some points it just ceases to be fun for some people, and they slap it away on their bookshelf to collect dust. But trust me, STICK WITH IT. Struggle with it, TRY it. The story in of itself is amazing, it's exciting, it's terrifying and depressing and hopeful all at the same time. You cheer as much as you rage as much as you cry. You want these characters to succeed but by the middle of the book you don't know what you want them to succeed AT because their goals are so convoluted you don't know where you're going. This book is disturbing at points, so disturbing I had to put it down for a while just to collect myself. It isn't SCARY. There are no mass murderers jumping out at you from the dark. But it's DISTURBING in that you'll want to sleep with your lights on, and walk-in closets will never look the same. Please. Try this book. And when you fail. Try again. And when you succeed. Do it again. Keep reading, keep twisting keep turning keep trying to understand. Because once you do, once you finally get it and finally understand everything this book is trying to tell you, you won't want to stop.
House of Leaves earns 5/5 stars from me.
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