It’s not often that a book leaves me speechless. Sometimes I get a little “wow” reaction at the end, or a, “that was clever/neat/fun.” But when I finished reading The Logogryph, my reaction was to sit back (albeit in a crowded train) and just try to let my brain absorb all I had just read.
It’s a strange book, starting with the charming presentation, which is what drew me to it in the first place. I discovered it while perusing the bookshelves at my work. We didn’t actually publish it, but occasionally we get titles from another dimensio–er…publishing house that end up there. For the version I found, the book itself has an outer sheath that looks like this:
You slide the book proper out of this, and begin to read.
The subtitle is: A Bibliography of Imaginary Books.
It begins with a small boy’s first interaction with a family outside of his own. His fascination with the mother, father, daughter, and the fate of their son becomes an extended mythology that pops up throughout the book again and again. The book is a series of stories in miniature, combined with discussions of various books, authors, and realities that never existed–such as an entire city populated by people who do nothing but read, or the publishing annals of Atlantis, the craft of reading books written in water and stone, or an Appendix that contains everything that has ever existed.
In essence, it is a book that explores the nature and mystery of reading and stories, and the power that these tomes can hold over our minds…how they conquer our thoughts and have the power to reshape us, for better or worse. But the language used is far from dry or distant. No simple literary essay here. The words enchant, meshing reality and fantasy so subtly that it becomes difficult to distinguish between the two.
Here is an excerpt from the first page:
“The particular volume I’m looking for is nameless, lacking a cover, title page, or any other outward markings of identity. Over the centuries its leaves have known nothing but change. They have been removed, replaced, altered, lost. The nameless book has been bound, taken apart, and reassembled with the pieces of other dismembered volumes, until one could ask whether there is anything left of the original. Or if there ever was an original.”
I honestly can’t say enough about this book, and I realize if I say too much, it would ruin your own reading of it. Maybe it won’t affect you as strongly as it did me, but can you take that chance? This is one gem I plan to come back to and turn over and over in my hands, exploring every facet in whatever light is available.
I see that smile.