What's the weirdest book you ever tried to read?

anything by herman hesse. NAP

The Bible, what were they on when they wrote that.

Ulysses.

James Joyce was either brilliant or bonkers.

^^^^^

Tried that about 4 times, gave up after a few chapters.

As boring as fack.

any religious book (NAP)

I have read several books written by Amelie Nothomb and they have all been very odd.

Another vote for Ulysses here. I don't know how many pages it ran to but I won't get those 50 pages of time back.

Finnegans Wake, also by Joyce, makes Ulysses look like a Janet and John book.

Ulysses is indeed turgid - yet considered by many the finest literary achievement in the history of Western Civilization.

A Clockwork Orange is another I could never warm to.

Having read both Ulysses and Finnegans Wake, I don't know why anyone would choose to read either of their own free will, but FW is indeed much the harder to make sense of. I wonder if it is even possible without reading another book telling you what it's all about.

I found Ivanhoe by Sir Walter Scott pretty heavy going.

I think I gave up on page one.

An Aunt bought it me for Christmas one year.

I think I was about 10 at the time

What was she thinking?!

The Adventures of Anybody by Richard Bandler is pretty weird.

I think I got it but I'm not sure.

I must give it another read.

I thought Ulysses was a good read.  Molly Bloom's soliloquy was top notch.

I loved Dubliners.

I've tried Finnegans Wake several times.  It's hard going.

I've heard that the title of every Thomas Moore song is mentioned.

I suppose The Trial and The Castle by Franz Kafka could also be described as weird and dreamlike, though I enjoyed them both at the time.

Midnight's Children by S Rushdie ....hugely acclaimed by many but irritated the hell out of me and I had to give up quarter way through . Magical realism -pah!

The 120 Days of Sodom by the Maquis de Sade.

Ulysses isn't that difficult. Finnegan's Wake is quite impossible unless you are multi-lingual,which Joyce was and I'm not.
Thomas Pynchon I can't cope with at all. I got through one of his shorter ones but didn't like it and didn't really understand it. 10 pages is as far as I got with Gravity's Rainbow.
A cult US feminist author who is quite unreadable is Kathy Acker.
The Bible is more boring than difficult except for Ezekiel in the Old Testament and Revelations ( George W Bush's fav )in the New Testament. Both read as though they were written by guys who had ingested nothing but magic mushrooms for 20 years.

Years ago someone lent me a Tolkien book. Got as far as someone's "eleventy first birthday" and gave up in disgust. Worse than trying to read the Old Testament.

Shark by Will Self, it's ok but has to many  recondite words for my predilection.

Devils of Loudun by Aldous Huxley.

I read Brave new world and thought yeah this guy has something.

Devils weirded me out and is still unfinished in a cupboard somewhere.

'The Glass Bead Game' for me. EastofEden has already mentioned Herman Hesse,though I've loved most of his other work.

The first 2 novels of the Titus Groan triolgy  were excellent and I've made a number of attempts to complete 'Titus alone',without success.It has been said that following his experiences as a war artist at the Nazi death camps Peake had gone gaga whilst writing it and I believe it was completed by one of his children.

Make my hay    22 Sep 14 11:42 
Shark by Will Self, it's ok but has to many  recondite words for my predilection.

Five Go To Billycock Hill took a strange turn from the previous Famous Five books.

Alice In Wonderland is far out man.
Magic Stories, Remy De Gourmont, a different meaning with each reading.

Make my hay 22 Sep 14 11:42

Shark by Will Self, it's ok but has to many  recondite words for my predilection.

OK, who else had to look up "recondite"?


The reason I used to love reading Will Self's column in the Observer (and elsewhere) is that he always challenged you with a word you'd have to look up within a paragraph or two.  It does get hard going when there's a book full of them though.

Oops, didn't see taxis post.

'How to win friends and influence people.' a book by the pair of posters, Northernlad (Irish_Celtic) and ExtremeX (Menelaus)

Pretty hard to read with all the pages being blank.

Tristram Shandy or anything by Philip K. D1ck.

I agree about Titus Alone. It's totally different from the 1st 2 volumes. I think I ploughed through it but wished I hadn't bothered. Peake certainly went gaga and may have written it when he was going that way. Not heard it was completed by one of his children but could be true.
I find I struggle with all Russian novelists I've read,particularly Dostoevsky. Not unreadable but I find them weird in that they seem to inhabit a different mental universe.

Actually, that post by Salmon Spray just reminded me of "The Spiritual Man" by Watchman Nee of China. By some Secretariat-like winning margin the strangest book I've ever read -- yet I fear it might also be true...

Sebald wrote some unusual novels, not surprising for what I suspect was a horse.