A review by katherine_shelton
House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski

challenging dark mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

When I started this book I didn't add it to my Storygraph or Goodreads accounts because I was pretty sure I was going to "DNF" it, as the kids say. But for some reason I kept coming back to it. Parts were compelling, parts were utterly ridiculous, the pages with two sentences per page felt like a reprieve from the rest... The book is cavernous and it's flawed. I can best describe it as faux academic satire(?) that is pretentious and dry, but punctuated by occasional brilliance. Is it worth all the effort? Honestly, I don't know. I'm glad I read it, there are passages that I really loved. But it is a book with major snarkiness that will irritate a lot of people. Sometimes it has the energy of College Freshman boys with Madonna-Wh*re Complexes who have just discovered  Nietzsche and Libertarianism for the first time and think they're smarter and deeper than everyone else, and everything they say it dripping with snide irony and contempt. But it's not always like that, and there is value in the book - you just have to go down a hallway that feels like it will never end in order to find it. 
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