Night Film in What's the Name of That Book???

Mar 06, 2013 karen rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, from-publisher-or-author

good lord, remember marisha pessl?? she of Special Topics in Calamity Physics fame?? remember the immense fawning hordes of fans and the praise surrounding that book?? you might not, it was 7 years ago and all. but it was a Very Big Deal at the time.

and it was a book that i personally thought was just okay. i am a tough judge of books that claim to be like The Secret History. i might have said this once or twice or a dozen times on the internet. and i thought special topics was fine, just a litt ...more

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Sep 01, 2013 El rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: cuckoos, 21st-centurylit, library-borrow

Note to self: Read this Slate.com article when you finish the book. The title of the article is great.

I do this a lot where I read a book and then mentally compare it to other things I've read, other authors, other movies, other things. I hate that I do this because it's so unfair to the work I've just read, unfair to the author, like saying "The only way I can consider you any good is if I treat you the way I would treat this other person/thing that I adore. Good luck trying to overcome that!" Note to self: Read this Slate.com article when you finish the book. The title of the article is great.

I do this a lot where I read a book and then mentally compare it to other things I've read, other authors, other movies, other things. I hate that I do this because it's so unfair to the work I've just read, unfair to the author, like saying "The only way I can consider you any good is if I treat you the way I would treat this other person/thing that I adore. Good luck trying to overcome that!" It's really unfair, though I mean absolutely nothing by it.

That being said, this book is so much like some of my favorite peoples and things! Law & Order: SVU episodes, David Lynch movies (and his life), John Fowles, Rebecca, just to name a few.

I read Pessl's first book when it came out and was rather ho-hum about it. It was cute, but annoyingly so. It was smart, but precociously so. The only thing that saved it (and Pessl) for me was that she was so young when she wrote it that I could at least appreciate a glimmer of talent and I couldn't wait until she was old enough to really be able to cut loose.

This book is finally being old enough to really be able to cut loose.

It's dark and nightmarish and psychological. It's also a shit-load of fun to read. Don't go into it expecting anything, just sit down with it and read it. There are times when you'll wonder if the story ever will end, if anything will make sense in the end, if there will be more questions than answers, if you'll enjoy every minute of it, or if there's any importance to any of these mysteries and tricks and clues. The answer is (no spoiler here) yes and no. To all of those questions: Yes and no.

There's multi-media involved here, and I know I'm not the first to be somewhat reminded of Danielewski's House of Leaves, but it's only familiar in a peripheral sense. The books are both very unusual and interesting, but only superficially are similar in story. I'm not one for gimmicks or bells and whistles, but I have to admit that it really worked this time. And it's not over-the-top. It's (dare I say it?) sort of done classily.

This was a good time. Kudos, Ms. Pessl. This was worth the wait. ...more

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Jul 04, 2013 Melissa Rochelle rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: arc, mystery-suspense, read-2013

Looking at the reviews on Goodreads I feel like the only one that didn't love this book. It started out well...the author did a great job ratcheting up the creepy factor early on. Plus I really liked how McGrath's research, websites, etc were included. It made the story seem more real and definitely even more frightening. There were a few issues, like I didn't find it believable that Scott would just give in and let these two inexperienced kids join his "research team." However I let it slide an ...more

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Mar 03, 2015 Jessie rated it liked it

I'm a sucker for female horror writing. And I wanted to adore this book, but it fell short for me. The random, constant italics were irritating as hell. I loved some of the stuff about fandom, and all the horror movie stuff was well done, but it wasn't the triumph I expected. And the relationship between the main character and the young woman was one big cliche. Ugh. ...more

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