Yeah the title is kinda retarded but there's a context (school, of course). It comes highly recommended by the NYT (sort of a boon I read that list 3 months ago.. and that my memory is horrible). I was predisposed to love this since it takes place in school (high), this is the best book I've read in the last couple of years (2006-07) and I don't even think there are that many good books out there (count on one hand?). This goes on the list

'Calamity Physics tells the very inspired story of one Blue Van Meer, I love that name. There's school, a very impressive father/professor, Blue's own fascinating teacher and the clique she eventually infiltrates. Oh yeah, and of course, murder. Apparently Pessl is not really anything like the author. I had to read about it but yeah, the novel is very "Nabokovian" (a good thing)

I thought the strong supporting works, unending list of book references, and orgy of quotations (excessive? why I dunno) were real but they're all made up (even better.. ?). I love chapters, chapter titles and drawings (the artwork is by the author, rather scrumptious). This book has all three and a dry wit that charmed me with delight. Sadly it took me about 350 pages to realize each chapter is named after a novel, famous ones too. Go me (see chapter list at the bottom). In fact the whole book is structured around "required readings" to understand Blue, and the murder

At page 460 (close to the end, but not that close), I thought I figured the book out. You might really need to read this alongside Google or WikiPedia for a better experience

I wrote down all these page numbers because of awesome quotes (the book is so quotable it ain't funny): pages 12, 102, 59, 130, 165, 411. But then I ran out of time and had to return the book before I got to write em down. I did get this priceless nugget
"Is it me or is it obvious none of this ends happily", pg 283


Oh holy sheez, they're trying to make a movie out of it, 2009 yeah? (as of April 07)


I read that I might like Donna Tartt's The Secret History which I've ordered from PaperBackSwap, nice


Large print and UK covers (I like the US one best, though the UK one has a certain sensibility)



Chapters (I got nothin but time)
Part 1
1. Othello, William Shakespeare
2. A Portrait Of The Artist As A Young Man, James Joyce
3. Wuthering Heights, Emily Bronte
4. The House Of The Seven Gables, Nathaniel Hawthorne
5. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
6. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
7. Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Pierre Choderlos de Laclos
8. Madame Bovary, Gustave Flaubert
9. Pygmalion, George Bernard Shaw
10. The Mysterious Affair At Styles, Agatha Christie

Part 2
11. Moby Dick, Herman Melville
12. A Moveable Feast, Hernest Hemingway
13. Women In Love, D. H. Lawrence
14. "The Housebreaker Of Shady Hill", John Cheever
15. Sweet Bird Of Youth, Tennessee Williams
16. Laughter In The Dark, Vladimir Nabokov
17. The Sleeping Beauty And Other Fairy Tales, Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch
18. A Room With A View, E. M. Forster

Part 3
19. Howl And Other Poems, Allen Ginsberg
20. The Taming Of The Shrew, William Shakespeare
21. Deliverance, James Dickey
22. Heart Of Darkness, Jospeh Conrad
23. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, Ken Kesey
24. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
25. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
26. The Big Sleep, Raymond CHandler
27. Justine, Marquis de Sade
28. Quer Pasticciaccio Brutto De Via Merulana, Carlos Emili Gadda
29. Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe
30. The Nocturnal Conspiracy, Smoke Wyannoch Harvey
31. Che Guevara Talks To Young People, Ernesto Guevara del Serna
32 "Good Country People", Flannery O'Connor
33. The Trial, Franz Kafka
34. Paradise Lost, John Milton
34. The Secret Garden, Frances Hogdson Burnett
36. Metamorphoses, Ovid