Which Unreliably Narrated Book Should You Read?

Your answers show that you may enjoy "Lolita", a poetic and tragic book by Vladimir Nabokov. This notorious but undeniable gorgeous tale is the story of a 38 year old literature professor, Humbert Humbert, who becomes obsessed and sexually involved with a 12 year old girl named Dolores Haze. The rest, as he says, is rust and stardust. Lolita quickly attained a classic status; it is today regarded as one of the prime achievements in 20th century literature, though is also among the most controversial.
Interested? Here's a quote to get you started.
"All at once we were madly, clumsily, shamelessly, agonizingly in love with each other; hopelessly, I should add, because that frenzy of mutual possession might have been assuaged only by our actually imbibing and assimilating every particle of each other's soul and flesh."
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Your answers show that you may enjoy "American Psycho", a disturbing and satirical book by Bret Easton Ellis. The story is told in the first person by Patrick Bateman, a serial killer and Manhattan businessman. Some countries deem it so potentially disturbing that it can only be sold shrink-wrapped, but critics rave about it and academics revel in its transgressive and postmodern qualities.
Interested? Here's a quote to get you started.
“I had all the characteristics of a human being—flesh, blood, skin, hair—but my depersonalization was so intense, had gone so deep, that my normal ability to feel compassion had been eradicated, the victim of a slow, purposeful erasure. I was simply imitating reality, a rough resemblance of a human being, with only a dim corner of my mind functioning.”
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Your answers show that you may enjoy "A Clockwork Orange", a shocking, but quirky book by Anthony Burgess. Set in a near future English society that has a subculture of extreme youth violence, the novella has a teenage protagonist, Alex, who narrates his violent exploits and his experiences with state authorities intent on reforming him. When the state undertakes to reform Alex—to "redeem" him—the novella asks, "At what cost?". The book is partially written in a Russian-influenced argot called "Nadsat". According to Burgess it was a jeu d'esprit written in just three weeks.
Interested? Here's a quote to get you started.
“If he can only perform good or only perform evil, then he is a clockwork orange—meaning that he has the appearance of an organism lovely with colour and juice but is in fact only a clockwork toy to be wound up by God or the Devil.”
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Your answers show that you may enjoy "The Catcher in the Rye", an entirely notorious book by JD Salinger. A controversial novel originally published for adults, it has since become popular with adolescent readers for its themes of teenage angst and alienation. The novel's protagonist Holden Caulfield has become an icon for teenage rebellion. The novel also deals with complex issues of identity, belonging, loss, and connection.
Interested? Here's a quote to get you started.
“That's the thing about girls. Every time they do something pretty, even if they're not much to look at, or even if they're sort of stupid, you fall in love with them, and then you never know where the hell you are. Girls. Jesus Christ. They can drive you crazy. They really can.”
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Your answers show that you may enjoy "Wuthering Heights", a dramatic and famous book by Emily Bronte. Although Wuthering Heights is now widely regarded as a classic of English literature, contemporary reviews for the novel were deeply polarized; it was considered controversial because its depiction of mental and physical cruelty was unusually stark, and it challenged strict Victorian ideals of the day, including religious hypocrisy, morality, social classes and gender inequality.
Interested? Here's a quote to get you started.
“Catherine Earnshaw, may you not rest as long as I am living. You said I killed you--haunt me then. The murdered do haunt their murderers. I believe--I know that ghosts have wandered the earth. Be with me always--take any form--drive me mad. Only do not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh, God! It is unutterable! I cannot live without my life! I cannot live without my soul!”
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Your answers show that you may enjoy "The Perks of Being a Wallflower", a sentimental and very human book by Stephen Chbosky. Its narrator is an introverted teenager known as Charlie, who describes his experiences in a series of letters to an anonymous stranger. Set in the early 1990s, the novel follows Charlie through his freshman year of high school in a Pittsburgh suburb. Intelligent beyond his years, he is an unconventional thinker; as the story begins, the reader learns that Charlie is also shy and unpopular.
Interested? Here's a quote to get you started.
“So, I guess we are who we are for alot of reasons. And maybe we'll never know most of them. But even if we don't have the power to choose where we come from, we can still choose where we go from there. We can still do things. And we can try to feel okay about them.”
Happy reading!