The Raw Shark Texts
Ratings35
Average rating4
15
Ratings35
Average rating4
A thrillingly original novel published in thirty-three countries to worldwide acclaim, The New York Times Magazine called The Raw Shark Texts a genre-founding work of fiction.
Eric Sanderson wakes up in a house he doesn’t recognize, unable to remember anything of his life. All he has left are his diary entries recalling Clio, a perfect love who died under mysterious circumstances, and a house that may contain the secrets to Eric’s prior life. But there may be more to this story, or it may be a different story altogether. With the help of allies found on the fringes of society, Eric embarks on an edge-of-your-seat journey to uncover the truth about himself and to escape the predatory forces that threaten to consume him. Moving with the pace of a superb thriller, The Raw Shark Texts has sparked the imaginations of readers around the world and is one of the most talked-about novels in years.
Reviews with the most likes.
consider my reading slump officially over, i tore through this shit in a little under 24 hours
oddly compelling and a damn fun read. the only place this falters is the romantic subplot, with scout being a bit underdeveloped yet it's not a major drawback. not sure how i'd classify this asides from some loose genre terms and obvious postmodern influences, but whatever this is, its completely my thing haha
also: the third lightbulb fragment was where this totally clicked with me. i wasnt totally invested on an emotional level but the described conversations with clio's father genuinely broke my heart.
above all i really like how Hall describes such mundane things in a genuinely interesting way, which puts a great edge to the amnesia premise. cool writing style for sure, i'd love to read more in a similar vein
I loved it. After finishing it, it couldn't leave my mind.
What begins as a story of mental breakdown after a great loss, evolves in a full adventure with monsters, action and even secret societies. It's clever and mind-bending with the right touch of emotion. I really really loved the ending.
I really wanted to like this one. The idea of a predator of the mind manifesting in the real world is interesting, but I felt this could have benefitted from about another 100 pages.
The book struck me as a sort of cross between The Eyre Affair and House of Leaves, combining the sort of inventive alternate realities of Fforde with the pomo typographical play of Danielewski. As with most X meets Y formulations, this one does not really do the book justice. Despite Hall's invetive metatextual world of word sharks, un-spaces, thought virus tycoons and conceptual boats the emotional core of the story is the protagonist's attempts to come to grips with the past and his own grief, guilt, memory. (A comparison with the movie Memento might also be apt, though Shark is more hopeful, less nihilistic.) An engaging, playful, but also very moving book.
