 Welcome to Church of the Chair where we're all going to leave behind an epic TBR when we die. I'm your host E and today we're doing a discussion video. This video, other than the intro, is going to be like the other discussion videos I've been doing. A throwback to how I used to do the videos with little to no edits whatsoever. Today I want to talk about a handful of books, there's five of them, that I enjoyed really loved that no one ever talks about. And the reason I'm doing that is because, as I said in my review yesterday, Steven Markley's The Deluge, while I absolutely love this book and it is now in my top, probably my top 10, I keep wanting to say top 20 but I believe it's going to boot out a specific book. If you want to know what that is, let me know down there in the comments. But yeah, this one, I don't think too many of my viewers, friends, fans are going to be interested in this one. But I want to take a moment and talk about books that I have loved that are either polarizing or that no one has ever heard of. But before we get started, I need your help picking out the next book I'm going to be reading for time for a tome and I have three options. Don't vote down there in the comments section, go into the description of the video and click on the link to go vote in the poll for what you want me to read next. The next long book I'm going to be reading and your choices are A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth, which is 1400 pages, absolutely nuts. Next one is A Horror Novel by Mediana Enriquez called Our Share of Night. I've read a considerable amount of this already, but I keep putting it down and I have been ever since I got the ARC from the publisher and that was over a year ago, so I'm going to have to restart it. But if you guys want to see this one, vote for that one. And the last one is one that I just picked off the shelf because it was over 600 pages and it looked interesting to me and that is Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Dewar. I believe that's how you pronounce his name. So yeah, go click on that link. You can do it now and come back to the video or you can do it after the video is done, but please go vote in what you would like to see me review next. The first book on books that I love, that you probably haven't heard of is Grasshopper Jungle by Andrew Smith. This is a book about a grasshopper apocalypse where people are turned into giant, no, no, sorry, they're not turned into the giant grasshoppers invade the world. It's not an alien thing. In fact, I don't remember the catalyst, but I do remember there being some kind of grasshoppers or locusts. I can't remember which one it is. I think it's a misnomer. I don't think they're called grasshoppers. Maybe they're praying mantis anyways, but in this one, it is a love story also that involves two young men and a girl, and the young man is trying to decide whether or not he's more interested in his friend or his current girlfriend. And this is the only YA novel I've ever enjoyed with a love triangle in it. It also has my esteemed award. That's a joke for the best YA novel I've ever read. Now, mind you, I don't read a whole lot of YA, but this one has stuck with me. It is hilarious. It is brutal and gory. So if you're a horror fan, definitely check it out. But it's one of the ones that always gets overlooked. Most people, when they think of Andrew Smith, if you've read Andrew Smith, is a winger or a standby, stand something, stand in. I can't remember what the sequel is called. And while I love those books, this one is very special to me. Next up is a book for you, Lit Heads, out there who who do not mind experimental novels. My friend Josh sent me this one and it is Hors for Gloria. I picked this one second, so hopefully this discussion video doesn't get demonetized. But yeah, it's wild. And this is one of the inspirations I had to write a certain book of mine. So it has stayed with me ever since I finished it. It is a very slim novel. I believe it's under 200 pages. Yeah, it's 138 pages and it is about prostitutes and the various johns that they have and then one specific john that ends up with all of them or, you know, talking to them. It has some very wild scenes. Chad Lutzky, if you're watching this, I think you would get a kick out of this book. It has very dark moments. It has funny moments. There is no dialogue. There is dialogue, but it's more like a Cormac McCarthy where he doesn't use quotation marks. He uses an M dash. Sometimes he doesn't even use that. Like I said, it's very experimental and you're not going to find any of the norms that you would find in, you know, regular commercial fiction. But yeah, I enjoyed every single page of it. It's a wild ride. If you're into, if you're into experimental stuff, there's nothing surreal or let's see here. There's no plot whatsoever. It's just a slice of life. It's very short and I highly, highly recommend it. Josh, if you watch this, thank you so much for sending it to me. I will be jumping into all the other Voltman books that you sent. Volman, I keep wanting to say Voltman, but it's Volman. William T. Volman. Next up, we have a book that I have, I have fanboyed all over this channel in the past about and still not enough people have read it for my liking. I believe my friend Wayne Fenlon said, said thank you for bringing up the book because he loved it too. It might have been someone else. So I apologize, Wayne, if it wasn't you. But Palisades Park by Alan Bernert. Brenert, Brenert. Yeah, because it's B.R. Anyways, this one is about the real life Palisades Park. It's a boardwalk amusement park out by the ocean. And it is also a family saga. It is a fictional retelling of that of the family. But it is, oh, man, it is so good. It automatically made me an Alan Brenert fan. Some words, man. They just end up getting on. They just don't want to come out. Anyways, this one, it holds a very special place in my heart. I'm a huge fan of anything that has amusement parks, theme parks, carnivals, circuses, anything like that. And I think I've read all the ones out there, except for one that I just got from the thrift store. I think it's the circus of the land and the air, something like that. But if you have any recommendations for circus, carnival, amusement park, theme park, I've even read multiple YA books or tried them. The most recent one was Hyde by Kristen, someone. I didn't care too much for that one, but I've at least tried them all. But if you want to bring it, I've read the family, the Pilo family circus, geek love, all the big ones of Water for Elephants, which I absolutely adored. So it was I'm kind of biased here because it has my favorite location setting. But also the family drama and the family saga of it, too. I really, really loved. It's not it's not so far toward John Irving. But it does have that down to earth, the writing and beautiful sides that I just I just absolutely fell in love with it. The next one is a book that I point to anyone who has depression, anxiety, PTSD, even postpartum depression, any of those things. If you want a striking visual representation of depression and not really postpartum, but maybe I will give you a trigger warning if you're someone who's lost a child and that is triggering for you. That topic is then definitely stay away from this one. But it's Eleanor by Jason Gurley. It's very much in the tone and framing of like a Neil Gaiman book. It's about a young girl looking for her sister and maybe the afterworld, maybe something different. It's after a car crash and it's almost a trip through purgatory or limbo or however you will. But they come across they come across some very unique landscapes. At one point in time, there's a world with dinosaurs and meteors falling down. There's a world that is solid pitch black. It's it's amazing. And if you read deeply and catch all of the not comparisons, but the the allegory and the, you know, those things, the metaphor, the simile for depression and loss and grief is absolutely fantastic book that I don't hear enough people talk about. This one is one of those unique stories where the author published this as an independent book published by himself, and then he got picked up by Crown Publishing and the book was rewritten, reedited, all that good stuff. And this is the finalized version of it. In fact, Jason Gurley, at one point in time over on Instagram, if you sent him the book, he would draw pictures on the inside cover on the inside board, and I thought that was really cool. I don't know if he's still doing it, but he did it quite a bit. I don't even know if he's come out with anything since, but I would definitely read anything. In fact, once I get done with this video, I'm going to go check, see if he's published anything else. But yeah, if you haven't read Eleanor by Jason Gurley, fix that very quickly. And finally, this is a book that has been up and down my top 20 list. Sometimes it's in the top 10. Sometimes it's in the top five. It's always in the top 20. There is I've never read anything like this book, and that is The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson. The thing that sticks out the most for me is an idea or a theme of this thing called the bitch snake. Yes, you heard that right, bitch snake. And it's usually blocked out in the text like there will be a black bar over it. So only only says it once or twice. But the story is about a man who is a very attractive individual and he ends up while he's drinking and driving. He spills his whiskey all down the front of him. This is the very opening of the book and he ends up burning himself all over his entire body, but he loses his penis and testicles in the fire. So he has no reproductive organs whatsoever. And he ends up meeting a sculptor and they end up falling in love. And the story is four different stories told by the sculptor to the man. They're love stories. They got Viking, Japanese lore, all different kinds of wonderful, wonderful sequences that kind of. And then there's the framing mechanic of the main story. But each one of the stories ties into the main story as well. It is beautiful. Every single bit of it is fascinating. And I really wish more people would have read it. I know it is it is either one awards or it was very popular one point in time. It's had several printings, but I've never actually met anyone who's read it. So if you have read any of these books, I would love to talk to you more in depth, either down there in the comments or over on the discord. Either way, I would especially love to talk to people about the gargoyle and Eleanor, because those two books really spoke to me and I don't get a chance to talk about those books with people. They are also books that stuck with me so much. I mean, it's been it's been a decade since I read the gargoyle. I believe. Let me let me check. As I read it about the time it first came out and it was published in the what a day. Where is the year that it was published? Huh. Oh, 2008. So, yes, it it was around let's see here. It was before it was long. It was long after that, I would say. I probably read it around 2012. 2011 2012, something like that. But anyways, if you have read any of these books, let me know down there in the comments. But until next time, I'll hail the chair.