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Strangest Book You Have Ever Read?


Ammanas

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Here is mine:

1. Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut. This book is bonkers, but I find it very entertaining. Its hard to describe so I say just give it a chance.

2. Finnigan's Wake by Joyce. I never made it past the fifth page. To be honest I can't understand a word of it. It's supposed to be written in English, but it might as well be in another language. I will share the first paragraph (and yes I know the first letter is supposed to be capitalized.  It is not a mistake on my part):

    riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend

of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to

Howth Castle and Environs.

    Sir Tristram, violer d'amores, fr'over the short sea, had passen-

core rearrived from North Armorica on this side the scraggy

isthmus of Europe Minor to wielderfight his penisolate war: nor

had topsawyer's rocks by the stream Oconee exaggeratedthemselse

to Laurens County's gorgios while they went doublin theirmumper

all the time: nor avoice from afire bellowsed mishe mishe to

tauftauf thuartpeatrick: not yet, though venissoon after, had a

kidscad buttended a bland old isaac: not yet, though all's fair in

vanessy, were sosie sesthers wroth with twone nathandjoe. Rot a

peck of pa's malt had Jhem or Shen brewed by arclight and rory

end to the regginbrow was to be seen ringsome on the aquaface.

    The fall (bababadalgharaghtakamminarronnkonnbronntonner-

ronntuonnthunntrovarrhounawnskawntoohoohoordenenthur-

nuk!) of a once wallstrait oldparr is retaled early in bed and later

on life down through all christian minstrelsy. The great fall of the

offwall entailed at such short notice the pftjschute of Finnegan,

erse solid man, that the humptyhillhead of humself prumptlysends

an unquiring one well to the west in quest of his tumptytumtoes:

and their upturnpikepointandplace is at the knock out in the park

where oranges have been laid to rust upon the green since dev-

linsfirst loved livvy. 

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:huh: That's how I feel after reading that!

The strangest book I ever read was Lost by Gregory Maguire. I had already read Wicked, Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister and Mirror Mirror so I wanted to see his modern Christmas Carol. It was just bizarre and I stopped after the protagonist started talking about a cat stuck in the wall for no apparent reason during the Marley door knocker moment.

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6 minutes ago, Leiasqz said:

I guess the strangest book I ever read was "The Slow Regard of Silent Things" by Patrick Rothfuss, so I'm probably lucky.

I tried to listen to the audiobook, but it has two things going against it for me. 1. It was not narrated by the excellent Nick Poedehl 

2. Perhaps it got better, but from what I listened to it was about a girl meandering around by herself. Not my cup of tea.

I really need to give it another chance though. Perhaps next time with the physical book. 

Edited by Ammanas
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1 hour ago, Ammanas said:

1. It was not narrated by the excellent Nick Poedehl 

No, it was narrated by the author himself! :) Which I actually enjoyed, I think Patrick Rothfuss has a really nice voice.

1 hour ago, Ammanas said:

2. Perhaps it got better, but from what I listened to it was about a girl meandering around by herself. Not my cup of tea.

Can't really answer if it gets "better" since that would be spoiling the book, but yeah, I guess that book is one of those you either get really into, or you don't. Me, I liked being in her head, because she's rather interesting as a character.

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6 minutes ago, Orlion On a Cob said:

@Ammanas Can you really say you have read Finnegan's Wake if you only made it 5 pages in? ;)

I guess not. I guess to be accurate the thread title should be strangest book you have read/encountered. Have you read this book? I know you like books that are more...I am searching for the right word but the closest I can think of is avant-garde.

Edited by Ammanas
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31 minutes ago, Ammanas said:

I guess not. I guess to be accurate the thread title should be strangest book you have read/encountered. Have you read this book? I know you like books that are more...I am searching for the right word but the closest I can think of is avant-garde.

Not yet, the stars have not been quite right yet for that one. What I have read, I have enjoyed, though! 

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23 minutes ago, Orlion On a Cob said:

Not yet, the stars have not been quite right yet for that one. What I have read, I have enjoyed, though! 

Any tips to decoding it? From what I understand it's supposed to be a dream that occurs during one night spent in a tavern. I am basing this on a interesting article about one man's journey of actually reading this book and trying to make sense of it. I thought it was a interesting read:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/07/12/what-make-finnegans-wake/

Edited by Ammanas
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55 minutes ago, Ammanas said:

Any tips to decoding it? From what I understand it's supposed to be a dream that occurs during one night spent in a tavern. I am basing this on a interesting article about one man's journey of actually reading this book and trying to make sense of it. I thought it was a interesting read:

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/07/12/what-make-finnegans-wake/

Here's how I'm going to do it: 

1) Read his other prose work in order: Dubliners, Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man & Ulysses. 

2) Read a biography sometime before, during or after. 

3) Go with the flow. 

Like you mentioned, there is a dream like (and disorienting) quality to Finnegan's Wake which is part of the experience. Joyce uses language and culture from all over the place to accomplish this. As a result, particularly on a first reading, analyzing it should be kept to a minimum until you have an idea of the whole. 

For example, you pointed out that the book begins mid sentence. That's because it's a continuation of the final sentence in novel. It is one big literary loop, and as such, I think you could start anywhere and not have it impact the novel. 

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I'm not sure whether to call it strange but The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is an interesting story. It's available for free from the University of Virgina on their website. It's pretty different from the movie so it's worth a read.

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@Ammanas while it doesn't compare to the mixture of poetry, onomatopoea and old fashioned English that is Finnigan's Wake... My weirdest is a book titled "Vellum" 

I can't even really remember what the story was, because it jumped between different versions of the characters in different timelines/dimensions.

It was very... Disorienting. Every time I thought I had a handle on the story there would be a new shift and I'd lose it. 

After finishing it, it apparently fled to another dimension itself because I can't remember anything else about it. 

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Life of Pi was definitely one of the weirder novels I've read, but there was another one that my high school English teacher suggested by Ray Bradbury that I remember finding rather baffling... I'm having a hard time remembering the title atm.

Edit: the Bradbury book was called From the Dust Returned. (Thank Stormfather for GoodReads!)

Edited by Sunbird
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The OP mentioned Vonnegut, and I remember Slaughterhouse Five being kind of odd just because of how much it jumps around. It was probably supposed to give some insight to things like PTSD and other mental problems ex-military people can suffer from, which I got, until the alien abduction scenes started happening lol. 

I thought the first Dark Tower book was pretty weird too. 

I still need to read The Slow Regard of Silent Things. It's been sitting on my shelf for a few weeks. I knew it was a story about Auri though so it doesn't surprise me that it's more weird than the main KC novels. 

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23 hours ago, Ammanas said:

2. Perhaps it got better, but from what I listened to it was about a girl meandering around by herself. Not my cup of tea.

I really need to give it another chance though. Perhaps next time with the physical book. 

Slow Regard is up there among the strangest books I've read, and while I liked it, it is definitely just Aurie wandering around by herself.  It is pretty much a week in her life, and if spending a week in Aurie's head doesn't sound interesting to you, then it is probably better to just skip it.  at least try to get it from a library, no point spending money if you may not like it.

 

While Slow Regard for Silent Things is near the top of my list, it is probably beaten by Infinite Jest, and its 100 pages of end notes some of which themselves have further footnotes.  rounding out the top 3 is probably Slaughterhouse Five.

Edited by Dunkum
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Slaughter House Five has been brought up a few times in this thread. If anyone wants a good book that does interesting things with time lines  (1 forward story shown by regular numbers ascending at the beginning of the chapter and another story with roman numerals descending) try Use of Weapons by Banks

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3 hours ago, Calderis said:

If you thought that one was weird, did you finish the series? That's probably the most straight forward of the bunch. 

I've only read the first two. I guess the second one was kinda odd too now that I think about it, but I enjoyed it more so it was easier to look past it lol. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

Easily the weirdest book I've ever read is the "Area X Trilogy" (also called the "Southern Reach Trilogy") by Jeff Vandermeer. It's 3 books in 1: Annihilation, Authority, and Acceptance.

The whole thing is so surreal, you never know what's actually happening; you never know where in the world it takes place (though maybe Florida or coastal Georgia are good guesses), and you don't really know what ends up happening to most of the characters. Is there a villain? or just natural forces? or perhaps occult involvement (which occurred off-camera before the story starts). Is what's happening a good thing? or if it's a bad thing, is there any way to stop it? Almost everything is vague and undefined.

And yet ... and yet ... the story draws you in so well that you keep reading to the end, at which point you decide in your own mind what happens. (FYI - I have "lemmed" my share of books, and I was not tempted to do that with these at all.)

Very, very weird.

Supposedly they're making a movie of the first book now. I have no idea how they'll portray what Vandermeer wrote and communicate the same feeling of dread and mysteriousness (but not horror; skillful writing!). I'd like to encourage my fellow Shard-ers to read the books first, before seeing the movie.

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  • 10 months later...

Although its not anywhere near as strange as the two books in my original post I think the book I am reading right now (Snakewood by Selby) is really unique! It is a compulation that a fictional scholar puts together of various accounts of events surrounding a mercenary company. Some of the characters are not well educated and that comes across in their accounts by their grammer choices.

The book is a bit of a puzzle and too avant-garde for most fans, based upon the multiple negative reviews, but I really like it so far after reading about a third of it.

This is my fifth attempt to read it with my previous attempts only making it a chapter or so. Still this book kept calling me like a Siren and I finally have my head wrapped around it and am much further than previous attempts. Anyone looking for something different and similar to Glen Cook would like it I think.

Edited by Ammanas
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Strangest book I'd like to read, but haven't (and if I'm honest, am nervous to try and read), is House of Leaves by Danielewski.

I've read the reviews and still can't begin to imagine how it works and what it's about.  Not to mention the irregular formats of text and pages (google it).  It's like a novel with beautiful terrifying pages of visual poetry tossed in?

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The strangest book I've ever read is the mussel feast by Birgt Vanderbeke.

It is about a Family eating mussel  every week although nobody except the Father likes them. So one evening the Father is Late and they talk about him and what they are doing and so on. When he finally comes home his position as a patriarch is over.

Really, Really Strange.. .

Edited by Sorana
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1 hour ago, Sorana said:

The strangest book I've ever read is the mussel feast by Birgt Vanderbeke.

It is about a Family eating müssen every week although nobody except the Father likes them. So one evening the Father is Late and they talk about him and what they are doing and so on. When he finally comes home his position as a patriarch is over.

Really, Really Strange.. .

Sounds fantastic! 

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