Shovelmonkey1's Reviews > House of Leaves

This is not for you....

Or maybe it is.

House of Leaves is not an easy book to read. It will not only challenge your ability to hold a weighty tome at numerous different angles for prolonged periods of time as you endeavour to read text which is upside down, back to front and shoots vertically or diagonally up and down the page, but it will challenge your idea of what a novel is and how a novel should be presented.

Normally I like to try and keep my reviews short. None of you (this is an assumption, but a fair one I think) want to endure an Nth to the power of ∞ monologue about a book. Generally requirements from a book review are fairly short; is the book good, bad or ugly? Does it contain anything that might engage you or enhance your appreciation or understanding of the spinning ball of rock to which you are currently standing upon/lying/clinging to? Is the person writing capable of injecting a heroin shot of humour into the sinewy arm of the review in order to elicit a subdued snort of mirth? This is my criteria anyway. Each to their own.

I’ll begin by summarising the story. This is not for you either. This is for me, for my own sanity and clarity of thought which has been somewhat muddied in the reading process. And by muddied I mean dirtied and sluggish with the consistency of a KFC Krushem (TM).

House of Leaves is a book about a house. The house has unexpected spatial characteristics- it is larger on the inside than it is on the outside. The spatial characteristics are discovered and investigated by the owners of the house and their friends. They film these investigations. These investigations are then compiled into a series of short films called The Navidson Record. The Navidson Record becomes cult viewing and copies of ever-decreasing quality circulate amongst academics, the media and stoned students.

A blind man named Zampano attempts to assess the quality and verity of The Navidson Record including the films and the vast body of white and grey literature generated by academics in order to clarify once and for all if the film was the real deal or one of the most elaborate hoaxes of the 20th century. Zampano dies before completing his magnum opus and the disordered, arbitrary scattered notes and fragments of his work are discovered by his next door neighbour, a drug-hoover named Lude. Lude calls in his friend Johnny Truant (JT).

JT develops a fixation with the Navidson Record and attempts to complete and order Zampano’s life work in order to draw his own conclusions about what actually happened in the house on Ash Tree Lane. Truant himself who may or may not be the final architect of the work which forms the core of the published version of House of Leaves begins to suffer a mental breakdown. JT's story runs concurrently with the Navidson Record but is only ever presented as a series of footnotes. The result of this is unclear but one way or another, at the hands of a series of anonymous editors (-Ed) the book makes its way into circulation.

Is this still for you?

Maybe.

The problem (interpret the use of the word problem here as being either good or bad depending on your own perspective) with House of Leaves is that while the words printed inside the pages (leaves) are telling you one thing and sending your thoughts in one direction, the actual layout, font, size and colour of the text are sending out a whole other set of messages. Which ones do you listen to? I think you’re supposed to pay attention to both but this may cause your cerebral cortex to cleave in two so this is a choice that you make early on, and at your own risk.

As a work in its own right, and not just as a story or series of conjoined narratives, House of Leaves will probably mean different things to different people. I was very interested in the Navidson Record and the presentation of a multi dimensional qualitative space. You might be more interested in exactly which screws are coming loose in JT’s brain or what motivated Zampano in the first place. Much like the choices faced by the people exploring the inner corridors of the house, you will be forced to pick your own path through the book and once you have done that there is no turning back or you will have to start from scratch.

Is this the end of the review? Yes. I cannot break this down further in constructive sentences and the brain dribble is now getting into the cracks between the keyboard. I can however, much like Zampano and his snippets, notes and scribbles, provide a non-linear collection of random thoughts and observations which might act like the mythical skein to help you weave your own way through this labyrinthine text... what you do when you reach the Minotaur at the centre is entirely up to you:

1. Symbols and code: Allegedly there are a lot of hidden codes within this book. These might be numerological, symbolic, visual or in any other semantic form you can think of. The internet is awash with web pages and forums dedicated to HoL and the discussion of coded meanings. Seek them if you will, but don’t expect them to actually clarify anything. One code I did pick up on was the use of random symbols, frequently those used in ground to air visual communication – these were used instead of a numeric reference system for the footnotes. Did they have any direct bearing on the text? Dunno. The one that really did baffle me was the insouciant and sneaky  symbol which appeared for no fathomable reason at the bottom right-hand of page 97.

2. Capitalisation: Adjectives with capital letters where no capital letters are required by the dictates of English Grammar. Similarly deliberate mis-spellings. Go figure.

3. Inversion: Inverting of main text and footnotes so that the main text becomes a foot note and vice versa. Is this symbolic of the main text becoming a sub text for something greater?

4. Colour: The significance of the word house highlighted in blue wherever it is mentioned. This remains true for the cover, footnotes, end notes, index, appendices and publication information. Blue can confer the idea of calmness, a natural environment or stability. It can also confer the notion of authority and power. It is a primary colour and therefore is at the root of many other colours and could be interpreted as a starting point. It can represent sky and water, two elements which are necessary to human survival. But blue can also mean depression and coldness. So what does it mean in the context of House of Leaves? Everything, nothing, something. I can offer no conclusions here and it is never explained.

5. Displacement of objects. At one point Karen Navidson's children tell her that all of her Feng Shui artefacts have vanished from the house. I'm not a believer in Feng Shui but I also believe that anyone who believes that a crystal bullfrog or a well placed water spout can cancel out the possible malevolent evil of a room with more dimensions than a 3D hologram is possibly a little crackers anyway. Note, if you will that the exact list of missing objects in the exact same order is recited in the interview with Hunter S. Thompson on p363. He used them as missiles rather than sticking to their traditional Feng Shui purpose. What does this all mean? No idea. Objects are disappearing through the house and moving into different spaces within the book. Go figure.

I could go on. And I will probably more than you would like , but for now this will have to suffice as I need to pop out and get some crazy glue with which to stick my cloven grey matter back together.