Well, it took me almost three months to re-read this book, and anyone who's read it will understand why. This is about the farthest thing from a beach read I can imagine. House of Leaves is a story within a story within a story, but the stories are all kind of the same, and in the end you can't pick out the fact from the fiction. I'm having a really hard time even thinking of what to say about it. This is more than a book - it's a slice of something bigger and darker then just a story you can shelve in the fiction section of your local library.
The primary story in this book is a retelling and academic analysis of a film that doesn't exist; The Navidson Record. This film, made by the Navidson family to record their "settling down" in domestic life, instead begins to capture eerie misalignments within the space of their house. For instance, the first major clue that something is amiss is when the interior length of the house is measured to be 1/4" longer than the exterior length. Like the stirrings of a sleeping beast, the house gradually shifts and settles around the perplexed family, culminating in the appearance of a door in the living room which leads to a strange, black hallway. As the family explores the vast darkness that lies at the center of the house, we see a similar darkness overtaking our narrator and star of the second story, a man named Johnny Truant. Johnny, who has come across the documents detailing the Navidson Record, finds himself consumed by the lure of the house, and eventually loses everything it pursuit of it. But this is far more than just a simple horror story, and everything is much more than it seems.
This is, hands down, the most complicated and fascinating book I've ever read. I hesitate to even call it a book - more like a collection, or a collage. If you're read any of my previous reviews, you know that I have a major love affair with stories that don't have easy solutions, that leave you with more questions than answers. I feel like they're more true to life, somehow - I mean, nothing gets wrapped up in a neat little ball. Real stories are messy - they don't have proper plot progression and carefully planned themes and appropriate endings for everyone involved. Real stories have a thinly veiled chaos to them, and you see that in this book. Despite all the footnotes, the academic posturing, the fake interviews with "professionals" and "critics" who seek to hide the meaning of the story behind citations and terminology, what stays with you after the final page is the sense of deep uneasiness within the book - the sense of fear it leaves within you. It's that fear the pulls Navy and Johnny both down, and it's the same darkness that can't be explained away. It's there, even if we don't see it just yet.
Aside from making me afraid to walk home in the dark, this book also doesn't hesitate to play around with it's own appearance. There are at least five different fonts, entire pages taken up by one word, diagrams, diagonal writing, boxes leading to other pages - the book itself is kind a maze. There's a twenty or so page section where you have to rotate the entire book at least 90 degrees for every page, which got me a lot of funny stares when I was reading. There's also languages aplenty, even ancient Greek and Hebrew, and since some of the quotes remain untranslated, I even got to wipe the dust off my latin dictionary and start translating. It's a fun book to read, when it's not being completely terrifying.
Anyway, please read this book. I can't even begin to talk about it; it defies explanation. You'll just to have to experience it for yourself. It will take you a long time, you will be confused, you will become frustrated when footnotes go on for three pages, you will want to club Johnny over the head, you will desperately wish the Navidson Report was a real movie, and you will wonder if it's all true.
In summary:
"Don't be scared.
Don't be.
(I am.)"
