House of leaves - has anybody read it or have comments

[ajax090]

Thinking of starting this book, have read some good reviews, has anyone read it or have anything to share about the book

[Pryderi Agni]

Wow...Something (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Leaves) tells me this book is gonna be interesting. Wonder where I can find it, though.

[Babbalanja]

I really loved this book when I read it about eight years ago.

The multi-leveled story focuses on a strange house whose interior dimensions exceed the exterior ones, and in which a spiral staircase leads down into a bizarre void. The house is owned by a documentary filmmaker who makes a film about his explorations and his estrangement from his wife and children. A blind academic writes a thesis on the movie. After the academic is savagely murdered, his thesis is found and read by a loner neighbor with his own haunting void.

It's not all pain and mystery, though. It's a wonderful satire on academia, as well as a thrilling hypertextual experiment. The novel is fun to read, taking advantage of all sorts of typesetting gimmicks.

Regards,

Istvan

[ajax090]

it wasn't real hard to find it, i checked out a copy from my library and then found a soft back copy at half price books. I would be interested if someone wanted to read it along side me. Maybe we can get it to be the reading of the month for Janurary. Anyone in?

[calebjross]

House of Leaves is truly a great, great book. If you read it, and like it, check out other examples of illustrative metafication texts. The Raw Shark Texts comes to mind. Danielwski's other widely-available novel, Only Revolutions, has similar elements.

But nothing I've read so far tops House of Leaves in the metafiction department.

Let us know what you think.