Bizarre, weird, taboo or unorthodox books that you've read.
223 replies, posted
By the same guy who made Lolita, Vladamir Nabokov, I feel Pale Fire is pretty damn underrated. It's basically a 999-line poem but the bulk of the novel is taken up by end-notes by a friend of the late author of the poem as he (incorrectly and obsessively) analyzes it while telling his own story. Sort a like a proto-House of Leaves kinda.
From a Buick 8, by Stephen King.
A not-quite-a-Buick-8 turns out to be a living portal into another dimension. Some pretty awesome shit happens.
Also, anything from H.P. Lovecraft. Especially the Colour out of Space.
[img]http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c9/Virgicides.jpg[/img]
The story, which is set in Grosse Pointe, Michigan during the 1970s, centers on the suicides of five sisters. The Lisbon girls' suicides fascinate their community as their neighbors struggle to find an explanation for the acts.
The novel is atypical in that it was written in first person plural from the perspective of an anonymous group of teenage boys who became infatuated with the girls, a style mirroring a Greek chorus. The narrator(s) rely on relics and interviews gathered in the two decades after the suicide to construct the tale. The novel is rich in descriptive detail, using observations about the state of the Lisbon house and the contents of the girls’ rooms to advance the plot. The effect is that the reader glimpses the novel’s main characters as if he or she were one of the neighborhood onlookers.
The movie is shite but the book is good.
I tried reading Naked Lunch... It never made sense. I also tried reading [url]House[/url] of Leaves.
William Faulkner also has a weird but effective writing style. Usually characters will lapse into a memory mid-sentence without any punctuation or just completely go batshit insane. hard stuff put pretty rewarding if you've gotta hold of it.
[quote=TV Tropes]William Faulkner hates you doesn't like you hates you you never had a sister Dalton Ames Dalton Ames Dalton Ames Dalton Ames Dalton Ames My father I have committed incest
sister. Stream of consciousness, odd spacing
hate you
south.
i dont hate it
fish
but he hates you[/quote]
[img]http://www.achievement.org/library/bookcovers/OneHundred_0.jpg[/img]
There's a scene in this book where a guy slams his huge pecker on a table. Need I say more?
[QUOTE=Pacmaney;30869345]While I haven't read it yet I might read something like the Book of the Dead or something from religions past that would seem odd today.[/QUOTE]
The Tibetan Book of the Dead actually makes a lot more sense than the explanation given by religions today.
[QUOTE=Protocol7;30874304]There's a scene in this book where a guy slams his huge pecker on a table. Need I say more?[/QUOTE]
Yes please.
for a new member this is an interesting yet nice alternative of a first post/thread as opposed to "guys i need help with my gmod" in gd
welcome to facepunch
as for bizarre literature --
Desperation by Stephen King
[img]http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-op1NrIXmhmg/TYudfO_tXKI/AAAAAAAAABg/qXdP94Ps5Xs/s1600/Desperation.jpg[/img]
Good book, but for the first 200 pages I was confused as shit.
In a "horror story" my brother was reading, a guy named his cat "nigger man".
This is about a man who kidnaps a woman, then keeps her in his house with no form of contact to the outside world. It's pretty weird, as you can imagine.
[img]http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_kbM0XaA7pn0/TCxGn0ShmZI/AAAAAAAAADM/YPaa1gTwOzM/s1600/The+Collector.jpg[/img]
[QUOTE=EpikEnvy2.0;30874434]for a new member this is an interesting yet nice alternative of a first post/thread as opposed to "guys i need help with my gmod" in gd
welcome to facepunch
as for bizarre literature --
Desperation by Stephen King
[img]http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-op1NrIXmhmg/TYudfO_tXKI/AAAAAAAAABg/qXdP94Ps5Xs/s1600/Desperation.jpg[/img]
Good book, but for the first 200 pages I was confused as shit.[/QUOTE]
Tak a Lah.
[QUOTE=blacksam;30869300][img]http://www.imcharmingyou.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/1.jpg[/img]
Thrown out of english class for reading this.
Oh no a guy who writes about getting drunk and bangs chicks and then writes about it.[/QUOTE]
I got thrown out of class my sophomore year for reading this book as well. :v:
I'm assuming this would count, although it's fairly popular. Thought-provoking, nonetheless.
[img]http://www.worldswithoutend.com/alt_covers/fahrenheit451.jpg[/img]
[QUOTE=Desolategrunt;30873726]That guy,
Is,
fucked up.
His books are the wierdest shit ever. In one of them there's a 14 year old kid who swims to the bottom of the pool, puts his ass on the filter. (which sucks in water) He then procedes to jack off under water with the pressure on his ass, then he tries to leave, [highlight]BUT it's stuck to his intestines and pulls them out.[/highlight]
The only way to survive was to bite it off. His parents find him naked with a long rope coming out of his ass on the deck. He can't eat anything that takes more than an hour to digest.
Oh and to top it all off his sister gets pregnant from the semen in the pool.[/QUOTE]
The intestines part is based off various true stories though
Deuteronomy a pretty grim read. It's all about stoning people.
Would Machiavelli's "The Prince" come under this heading?
[QUOTE=Uber|nooB;30874632][img]http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51ElHsP3n%2BL._SL500_AA300_.jpg[/img][/QUOTE]
i tried looking up what it was about, but all i could find was making me even more confusing
[quote=velcrocows.co.uk]Discover where Velcro Cows come from, how they affect the water cycle, and whether they can still walk after their legs have been removed.[/quote]
[QUOTE=Hobo Jesus;30865248]Haven't read it but i think it belongs here.
[img]http://static.funpic.hu/_files/pictures/630/17/39/33917.jpg[/img][/QUOTE]
Interesting. What's it about?
all i know is that i want to read it, and i want it now.
wheres my merge
[QUOTE=FreeHat;30874553]Tak a Lah.[/QUOTE]
for 1/3ths of the book that confused me
[QUOTE=Godflex;30873067]
Also, whilst not reading all of it, '120 days of Sodom' written by Marquis de Sade, a sadomasochistic, satirical observation of corruption etc etc, but written in the late 18th century. Features scat, torture, death and raping of young boys and girls.[/QUOTE]
Read some of that. I'm ashamed to admit that I couldn't stomach it. I'm pretty tolerant of just about any kind of subject matter if it has a point, but I think Marquis de Sade's point was the shock factor. I can safely say that 120 Days of Sodom is the filthiest thing I have ever read. It will make you feel violated. :v:
[editline]3rd July 2011[/editline]
[QUOTE=djshox;30873570]Don't forget these lovely books and their artwork:
[img]http://www.thestranger.com/images/blogimages/2010/10/29/1288370339-scary_stories1.jpg[/img][/QUOTE]
My 4th grade teacher called my parents to talk with them privately because she thought I was being abused or something. She figured normal kids didn't read those books.
[img]http://img1.fantasticfiction.co.uk/images/n10/n52408.jpg[/img]
The Manchurian Candidate - Richard Condon
It's a book about some American Korean War veterans who have been brainwashed by the Soviets, then returned home as part of a massive plot to take over the world. It was made into two very serious films.
The odd part is the book is incredibly silly and incredibly varied in tone. It'll go from incomprehensible, confusing verses to beautiful, salivatory poetry. Then it turns around and uses toilet humor and blunt words. For this reason, reading the book is a massively different experience than either movie.
But still a very good book in my opinion.
[QUOTE=Falchion;30864974]I'd bet someone is going to post "bible lol".[/QUOTE]
bible lol
I'm reading.
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/avfye.jpg[/IMG]
Oh, and re-reading this.
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/1ovKh.jpg[/IMG]
I guess that counts as unorthodox. Out of Position is really great.
[QUOTE=Roll_Program;30883297]I'm reading.
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/1ovKh.jpg[/IMG]
I guess that counts as unorthodox. Out of Position is really great.[/QUOTE]
:suicide:
[IMG]http://www.iupress.indiana.edu/images/books/9780253212344_med.jpg[/IMG]
It's been ages since I read it, but this book is great assuming you can get through it. It takes place in a remote stone-aged future and the whole book is narrated in a broken and "primitive" english. The story focuses loosely around the worship and attempted reconstruction of nuclear weapons, and of course features religiously themed Punch and Judy puppet shows as you can see on the cover.
Here's an excerpt from the book to give an idea on how it's written:
[quote][I]“I hispert back, "O, what we ben! And what we come to!" Boath of us were siffling and snuffling then. Me looking at them jynt machines, and him lissening to their sylents. Right then I didnt know where I wer with any thing becaws all on a sudden I wernt seeing any thing from where I seen it befor... Now all the sudden Eusa and Eusas head and the little shyning man had becom some thing[/I][I]woaly diifrnt in my mynd to what they were before. How cud any 1 not want to get that shining power from back way back?[/I][I]How cud any 1 not want to be like them what had boats in the air and picters on the winds? How cud any 1 not want to see them shyning weals terning?”[/I][/quote]Sure it's bizarre but that's the name of the thread right?
[QUOTE=Roll_Program;30883297]
Oh, and re-reading this.
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/1ovKh.jpg[/IMG]
I guess that counts as unorthodox. Out of Position is really great.[/QUOTE]
^ that's homo-erotica btw
[editline]3rd July 2011[/editline]
dont ask me how I know this
[img]http://notjustwandering.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/matterhorn.jpg[/img]
Gives a great perspective of the Vietnam war from a marine lieutenants view. Was refused for publishing twice took him 30 years to write it.
It gave a no holds barred view of the war including racism, the political side of the war, and every detail of combat including friendly-fire incidents.
Was hard to read for me at points.
[QUOTE=soccerskyman;30884056]^ that's homo-erotica btw
[/QUOTE]
because it really looks like a period drama about class relations in victorian england?
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