Eight books I love
number9dream — David Mitchell
Eiji Miyake goes to Tokyo to look for his father. The first David Mitchell I read and still one of my favourites.
The Manual of Detection — Jedediah Berry
A clerk is promoted to detective. There is a manual. There is also a lot of rain. Full of wry whimsy, heart and magic. One of my absolute favourites. It's the book I read if I'm feeling down and it never fails to give my spirit and my imagination the little bit of self-care it's needing.
The House of Sleep — Jonathan Coe
A house that once held students becomes a sleep clinic. The story moves between the two periods, following people whose lives have remained tangled together. Probably the first book to ever make my favourites list as an adult and has stayed on that list every since. I think it is probably also the first novel that ever made me laugh out loud. Give it at least 25 pages if you try it out. It starts out slowish but once I reach that point I'm always re-hooked.
PopCo — Scarlett Thomas
Alice Butler works for a toy company and starts receiving anonymous messages in code. Her grandparents taught her how to break codes. Her family has left her a few things to work out, too.
Night Film — Marisha Pessl
A journalist investigates the death of a reclusive horror director's daughter. It takes him back to a family he has investigated before, at considerable personal cost. There are similarities here with Pattern Recognition by William Gibson. It's a good next read if you enjoyed the thread about the found footage or you're a fan of alternate reality games.
Pattern Recognition — William Gibson
Film clips are appearing online, and people are trying to work out where they come from. Cayce Pollard is hired to find whoever is making them. Don't blame me if you find yourself wanting to dress exclusively in CPUs after reading this one. I do.
Remainder — Tom McCarthy
A man uses his money to reconstruct scenes he remembers, down to the smallest details. He hires people to repeat their parts. He wants it to feel real. I'm curious to re-read this one and then watch The Rehearsal to see what I find.
House of Leaves — Mark Z. Danielewski
Footnotes, appendices and spaces that shouldn't be there. Layers upon layers and hidden hallways. A book where the arrangement of the words is part of the experience. Scariest book I've ever read.
More books and other finds live in If I had a shop.