Fellow book nerds: House Of Leaves

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I read Mark D's House Of Leaves and lately I've been in the mood to read something that is comparable to it (anything that's mind binding or twilight zone-esque).

Any suggestions? Exclude anything from Palahniuk as I have that covered already. TIA

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I love reading. I've tried to read this book about 4 times and I just can't do it.

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I love reading. I've tried to read this book about 4 times and I just can't do it.

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You don't like the story itself or do you not like the way it is written? I can see how the way it was written could turn people off. But I thought the story itself was great. The chapters that dealt with the house itself and the exploration of it's halls were great, IMO. I couldn't put the book down during those parts.

Check out the poetry of James Tate.

Teaching An Ape To Write Poems

He writes really bizarre, surreal poetry. It itches you in weird places, but it feels good to scratch

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One of my very favorite books. I can't think of anything else like it, really.

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Agreed. I am on a mission to find something that rivals it. I'm currently about halfway through Michel Faber's Under The Skin. It started off really good and kept things suspenseful, but just took a very strange turn. I'm not far enough along yet to determine if that strange turn was for the good... It's definitely kept me intrigued enough to want to see what happens next though.

Without giving away the plot (one of those books that's better going into without knowing anything), here is a solid amazon user review:
"Imagine picking up a book, that on its surface, appears to be a bizarre thriller involving a mysterious woman who picks up strong male hitchhikers with an agenda not made obvious at first. You think "this sounds kind of fun and kinky" and so you start reading, expecting nothing more than a mundane road story with predictable twists and turns. However, in fairly short order, you find yourself turned upside down, without even remembering how you got there. I think I understand how Alice felt after falling down the rabbit hole. Nothing is what it seems."

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I read Mark D's House Of Leaves and lately I've been in the mood to read something that is comparable to it (anything that's mind binding or twilight zone-esque).

Any suggestions? Exclude anything from Palahniuk as I have that covered already. TIA

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The Manucripts Found at Saragossa - Jan Potocki

This is probably the closest thing to HoL, but it's completely different.


The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman

Required reading.

Riddley Walker - Russel Hoban

Again, somewhat close.

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TTownTiger

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If you liked House of Leaves, you might like stuff like Pale Fire by Nabakov, which I think in some ways is a predecessor to it (story in the footnotes reflecting on story being told). There are works by Borges, Cortazar, and others that are also ancestors. Currently, if you want to check out the Black Ocean Press list of books. Zachary Schomburg produces oddly beautiful surrealist works, and the Swedish poet Aase Borg is really out there. There's a lot of gothic surrealism being written right now, so it's hard to narrow it down. House of Leaves is really singular in that no book is actually like it, save for some more experimental books. I'd have to re-read the book right now to actually give you a good suggestions, as I read it years ago before I got into literature.

Also Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell.

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can you give a spoiler free summary of this one?

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It's about a house that's bigger on the inside than it is on the outside.

That's all you need to know. Read it and have fun.

I see a lot of surreal books in here, I don't know if I would ever label HoL surreal.

I've looked up a few of the books mentioned in this thread already. I'm really interested in these two so far:
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
The Manucripts Found at Saragossa - Jan Potocki

Edit: The Raw Shark Texts by Stephen Hall sounds interesting too.