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Position:Home>Books & Authors> Experimental narration?Question: Experimental narration!? Anyone have any recommendations of books with experimental/unconventional narration!? I'm looking to expand past basic third and first person!.!.!.
I'm asking because I'm interested in reading something unusual, and also because my head is hurting from all of the Twilight madness on YA!. I need confirmation that the world hasn't forgotten that other books exist!.!.!.Www@QuestionHome@Com Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: Someone above recommended House of Leaves!. I haven't read it, but a friend whose taste is generally good recommended it!. An excellent and very unusual book is Cloud Atlas by Mitchell!. It consists of 6 distinct but related narratives, set up in complex layers!. It starts with a diary kept by an American in the South Seas shortly after the California Gold Rush in the 1850s!. The next section is a set of letters written by a young composer around 1930!. In the course of these letters, he mentions reading the diary in the first section!. The next section is a mystery/thriller set around 1975, in which one of the characters is an elderly scientist who as a young man was the recipient of the letters in section 2!. And so forth, with the final section chronologically being set in Hawaii well into the future, after the collapse of modern civilization!. Each of the narratives except the last is split up, so part 1 stops suddenly and launches into part 2 and so on, until you get to part 6!. After part 6, you get the end of part 5, then the end of part4, etc, until finally you're back in the 1850s South Seas!. Cloud Atlas is, I believe, the only novel ever nominated for both the Nebula (a major prize for science fiction) and the Booker Prize (the top award for literary fiction in England)!. Another book with some unusual narrative techniques is "Aristoi" by Walter Jon Williams!. This is a story of a far future society dominated by an elite class of Aristoi, who are enhanced by both genetics and nanotechnology, so they can create for themselves and others complex virtual realities, and the creation of superbly detailed and realistic artificial realities is a principal art form and hobby!. One ability of the Aristoi is to 'fork' their consciousness, so they can experience several different realities simultaneously!. The narrator at times tries to use some innovative (and not entirely successful) narrative techniques to show this idea of the same person inhabiting multiple realities!. One more, quite well known, SF book with a very unusual narrative style is Hyperion, by Simmons!. Hyperion is the story of a pilgrimage, about 700 years in the future, to a distant star system to find a powerful and mysterious creature called the Shrike, who has the power to grant the wishes of each pilgrim, but is at least equally likely to kill them!. The main narrative is one where the 7 pilgrims each tell how they came to be there, modeled on the classic 'Canterbury Tales', with each pilgrim having a distinct narrative voice and style suitable to their story!. Hyperion should be read along with its sequel, The Fall of Hyperion, which is a more conventional, but still terrific, book!. Www@QuestionHome@Com I'm sorry that I'm not sure of any books that aren't in third or first person!.!.!.but I can recommend the Shopaholic series by Sophie Kinsella It's a rather hilarious light-hearted read about a woman who has a career in the financial journalist world, but it turns out she has a spending addiction herself!. And she lives this rather lavish lifestyle, but can't really afford it at all!. I love the entire series and I strongly recommend it if you decide one day that you want to step into the shoes of someone unrealistically real!!! If you'd like more details about the book or want to read it, I can offer you web links of the books online!. E-mail me about it if it sounds interesting!. Another great read is The Uglies, followed by The Pretties!. They're some pretty good books Or if you're really intyo the whole vampire craze I can also recommend books of the Black Dagger Brotherhood series!. That's more of a romance type book about each brother of a vampire cult and their lives and what not!. I hope I helped you out a bit!! (Vote me Best Answer please!) =D!.!.!.Deena BrownWww@QuestionHome@Com Ahaha!. Yeah, I've noticed!.!.!. XD I'm not sure how "experimental" these are, but they're very good!.!.!. Try the authors Sarah Dessen and Laurie Halse Anderson!. And then the Uglies series by Scott Westerfeld!. And Memoirs of a Teenage Amnesiac by Gabrielle Zevin And the young adult novels by Jerry SpinelliWww@QuestionHome@Com Wake, by Lisa McMann, though written in third person, is written in present tense as well, which is something you rarely see!. If you want more classical stuff, read Faulkner!. You'd probably love himWww@QuestionHome@Com The Lovely Bones It's narrated by the dead girl in first person but in my opinion it reads like third because she is telling the story of how her family and friends live on ten years after her death!.Www@QuestionHome@Com Try House of Leaves!. Its a very very experimental book and a fantastic read!.Www@QuestionHome@Com |