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A review by katewutz
House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
I cannot rate this. It was a mindfuck, and I know I only understood about a third of it. It’s probably genius, and I need to read it again to understand more of it….which is fun, a book that rewards multiple readings. I’m not the best at codes or riddles, so I was focused on the metatextual elements—a labyrinth that constantly points you back to the center, which is the author and the very nature of fiction. The Navidson Record doesn’t exist, Johnny Truant doesn’t exist, so where did all of this come from? Where fiction always comes from—the person whose name is on the front of the book. It should feel like a betrayal, since we do expect an author to help us suspend our disbelief and to build a world that feels real. But how can something this dense and this deep NOT feel real, even as Danielewski is giving the game away? It’s like the structural engineer in Karen’s “What Some Have Thought” talking about load-bearing walls. Ultimately, it stands because things in fiction stand if the author says they do. The hOuSe exists within this book because Danielewski says it does, until he tears it down. Every time I asked myself “but how is that POSSIBLE?” the answer was always, “Because it’s in a book someone wrote.” Danielewski created a whole world that looks enough like ours—celebrities and all—to fool us, then insists on showing us there’s nothing behind the curtain. It’s a weird kind of nihilism at the end. Like, is the book as devoid of everything real as the labyrinth? I think we have to say no, but explaining why that’s not true gets at the heart of what fiction even is and why we tell stories. Don’t read this unless you want to be thinking about it for a while…
Another thought, I think Danielewski proves with this book that fiction itself is less reliant on rules than we think. Readers can take some post-modernism, they can take two storylines happening simultaneously on one page. In a way, this is a more effective demonstration of that than Joyce, who is deeply impenetrable from the jump. Compared to Joyce, Danielewski gives us a story you can dive as deep into as you like and still get something out of it. If you just read this book lightly, skimming the academic parody and not bothering with the appendices or exhibits, you still get an interesting book. You’ll want to go back, probably, and look at all of that, but it’s up to you entirely.
Another thought, I think Danielewski proves with this book that fiction itself is less reliant on rules than we think. Readers can take some post-modernism, they can take two storylines happening simultaneously on one page. In a way, this is a more effective demonstration of that than Joyce, who is deeply impenetrable from the jump. Compared to Joyce, Danielewski gives us a story you can dive as deep into as you like and still get something out of it. If you just read this book lightly, skimming the academic parody and not bothering with the appendices or exhibits, you still get an interesting book. You’ll want to go back, probably, and look at all of that, but it’s up to you entirely.