Here's the first discussion!

ha, i read about 6 of the 106 pages. i need to focus on the book more then the boards.

i'll be back to post later.
but i would like to say that the 'always' is the perfect echo of hallways' thing scares the hell out of me. i'm afraid of my hallway. lol.


brb wrapping christmas gifts for you guys.

at first i was like its kinda hard to focus on it but after i got into its a good in a creepy-dont-wanna-be-in-a-room-with-the-door-closed-with-a-bunch-of-cats-sorta-way lol

Right away I was drawn into both of the stories. I think I'm enjoying The Navidson Record more, but the contrasting gritty stories by Truant I think blend nicely. I was worried that the two would not meld enough and I would loose sight of one story while reading the other (cause my attention span isn't that great). I am fascinated about how the author tries to make The Navidson Record real, by using magazine and tv references (like Rosie O'Donnell's quote) to make us think that this was really part of our pop-culture past.

Are you following the footnotes and reading the exhibits? I didn't at first and then went back. The crazy letters from Truant's mom I thought were strange and I couldn't connect them to either story, but if I had to try I connected them more to The Navidson Record.

I'm curious are the page numbers the same for everyone? I wondered cause I know sometimes different printings will change fonts, texts and stuff, but it seems like in this book it would be very important for all the books to be the same. For footnotes and page breaks and stuff.

So far I haven't been scared with anything I've read. I guess from reading a lot of H.P. Lovecraft, who is a master at writing the horrifying without actually telling you what you are envisioning. idk if that makes sense but he describes more the emotions around the event and not so much the event or details.

Obviously the house is... hmmm idk what word to use here, so maybe it's not so obvious. It's other dimensional. From another rehlm. I'm very eager to find out what happened on the 4th expedition.

All the characters are interesting. The family, Karen, Navy, the kids, Tom and the explorers. All made to be very believable (and more so with the footnote references).

Some quotes:

"Nous sommes fucked." ha ha I liked that. Fancy french with hard american.

"After the tenth fight, something really poisonous got inside me and turned off all the pain. As if all the feel-meters had blown." I completely related to this sentance on so many levels. Like when someone is living through a tragic event or just a horrible existance I can see how it all turns off and numbness ensues. It's like how you stop loving someone. Something just breaks and you stop.

"I'm taking you to the hospital" to me this was the scariest sentance in the book so far. The way he just said it but you knew that first he was going to hurt him so badly that the hospital would be the next stop.

I LOVED the whole part where he talked about the use of the word fuck. "A man who knew how important it was to say 'fuck' now and then and say it loud too."

Also so. I use that word a lot. I actually spell it out loud when I'm talking, like instead of "whatever" I say "s.o." I liked the way he said "so hardens you" because it does. It's such a dismissive word.

Kim and Gabbi - I think you'll like it once you get going. It's got some very interesting twists and except for the whole definition of an echo part, I don't think it's boring. I've been told that the first few chapters are the most dull and once we finish this first section then things really start to get good.

Steph - ooooh and when Daisy says she wants to play "always" that was kind of creepy. I'm worried about Chad. I hope the whole Truant fighting part didn't relate to what may or may not happen to Chad.

Does anyone else see foreshadowing that they are all dead now. I can't tell if they talk about them in past tense. I was trying to look for that (especially in media references).

lucky you that you're not scared. i'm afraid of my hallway now. last night i was wrapping presents with my back to the door (leading to the hallway) and i started having all these creepy images. but i've always been a little uneasy with my house. when i was little i was always afraid to go into the bathroom 3 times in a row. idk why but i felt like it was really dangerous. and it wasn't like someone was stupid enough to show me the movie Psycho and then i got scared. it just always was like that. and i used to see this...whatever (i don't even remember it but my family tells me). i would start crying that The Tapper was there, which is weird because if i was making it up i wouldn't have come up with a title for it. i don't even know what it was or did and i guess i never told anyone why i called it the tapper but i'm thankful it went away.

but as soon as the closet appeared and that stuff started happening i would have been SO out of there. curiosity is only good to a certain point.

i like the truant stories because they tell us a lot about him. i'm wondering if his mother's condition is hereditary because he does write like her (ahh maybe i'm just a huge nerd but it was so interesting to see that when her condition was at its worst she became a different person and signed differently- P instead of mom). and then the whole SOS signal thing. at first i was wondering what those dots and dashes were. but the check in the corner of the page i didn't understand. well beyond the fact that it was their thing.

all of those footnotes kind of get on my nerves, especially when they're just made up references. someone had a little too much time on his hands to make up all of those names.

oh i kind of had the idea that it was the house, not the fighting doing things to the kids. like why would daisy suddenly come up with the hallways thing? idk. i just want to scream at them to get out and don't look back.

idk if they're all dead now. i kind of thought navidson lived because you have his statement afterwards that it wasn't supposed to end up like that with the guns and everything. which kind of makes me think of the amityville horror too and i hope this isn't going to be a ripoff of that. i think it's going to get ugly.


gabbi: its nice to have you here to discuss with us.

Oh yeah! I forgot about all the names!! I just skipped them. tsk tsk but really I wouldn’t have a memory for any of them anyway.

I meant to mention the check mark too. I think that kind of stuff is interesting but I don’t think it has anything to do with the story. I think it’s more meant to make the book look like the manuscript. You know originally they said this book was passed around unbound for people to read before it was published. But that may be part of the whole Navidson Report too. It’s hard to know what’s real and what’s made up.

Awww I’m sorry The Tapper bothered you. I’m so glad he’s gone. Bad Tapper! When I was little we used to go into the bathroom and look into the mirror and say “I believe in Mary Worth” three times and then her face would appear. I don’t recommend it. It’s quite frightening (for an 8 year old). I’m pretty sure what happens is that it just takes that long for your eyes to adjust to the dark and then you can see your own image in the mirror. *shrugs* idk but I’m for sure not gonna try it. It spooooooked me out.

I agree, I’m not sure why they are staying. I feel the same way, certainly when the second closet showed up I would have said, let’s just go. Especially with the children. Parents should put their children at risk.

I thought the SOS thing was brilliant (especially the SO part) … ---

The thing that made me wonder if they were dead was that the Last Interview was missing. You know? I hope it doesn’t get horror flick ugly. I like suspense and all but I could do without gore.

the book seems pretty interesting, but I can't go to borders or any library with english books until this weekend, so glad you're discussing it great
I'm in the picture-it process.

mary worth? who's that? we used to do the same thing saying bloody mary 3 times but no one was ever brave enough to really try it.

i usually just skim the names because i'm ocd and i can't help it. and it always pisses me off.

i still didn't get why karen screamed when it grew and the book fell off the shelf. and it's funny because she's so against the house you would think she would suggest they get out of there. i kind of like the different points of view between navidson and her-it makes perfect sense the way she reasoned it that if navidson went into the hallway he didn't love her but his argument makes perfect sense too. and it says something about their communication.

the SOS thing was brilliant. and the SO - that's some scary foreshadowing. i kind of thought of the missing thing differently-they really couldn't have the last interview because then you'd know what happened and who survived. i just wish i didn't have to flip all the way to the back and find the right appendix and everything and then look at the stupid little footnote that said it was missing. i was pissed.

i don't think the check mark was part of the original report because that was his thing with his mom. i wish i knew the significance.

I don't know who mary worth is. That's just what we said. It was horrifying. BOOOO!

Yes, I didn't understand the bookshelf thing either. I mean they already knew the house had odd dimensions and shifted and stuff. idk maybe because it was her bookshelf? *shrugs*

Oh and that whole thing where she kissed that guy in the kitchen bfd I say. When they first hinted at it I thought she had sex with him, pssh just a little kiss, he got lost in the hallway! I don't like their understanding about if he goes in she leaves.

I just noticed you changed your sigy. Cute, go fish. Whose Derick? and what's that from?

oh that. idk who derick is and there was no last name so he's 'derick ?' it was a thing on the wall at my cousin's school. an english class presentation on minimalism..they had to write a story in six words (although i still say those aren't stories but some kick-ass sentences). a lot of them were funny or suspenseful but i thought that one was really clever so i stole it a little bit.

lol how could you believe in her if you didn't know who she is? silly girl. you don't even know if she's scary. she might have appeared in your mirror to hand you cookies.

oh yeah, i agree about the kiss thing but i think it's more significant because she used to cheat and she wouldn't have done it if she didn't feel like he betrayed her but it was like she did it to get back at him, which wasn't cool. i don't know how they could live with all the cameras in their house. i was thinking, if it's in the bedroom too wouldn't all the sex be on tape?

i don't like their understanding either. before she gave her whole perspective to tom i would have sworn she was just being selfish but it makes sense in a kind of loopy way.

i'm reading ahead. there are so many asides.

aahhh just lost my post dammit

summary:

ha worried about a sex tape

i made it all the way to page 27 woo hoo

I'm having issues following two stories at once with my add but i'm loving how well he bullshits. I'll listen to a bullshitter anyday as long as they are good at telling stories.

and i need to catch up to figure out what the hell you are talking about.

No one else said anything about cutting back the amount of reading, i'm guessing you are ok with the set pace? I'm too slow a reader for that too busy.

kim: oh no i always fall for the bullshit. idk if we're supposed to take johnny's story for truth. once you're into the next section it goes really fast because some of the pages only have one or two words on them.

i'm actually really far in and i'm not creeped out anymore, just kind of curious. i actually took notes on this book. so i meant to ask what you thought of Delial but then i found the answer to it.

some quotes...
"unfortunately denial also means ignoring the possibility of peril."

"chi dara fine al gran dolore?" "L'ore"
(who will put an end to this great sadness? the hours passing.)
i liked all of that stuff about the echo.

Yay yay yay! Too bad I couldn't be here sooner.

Stephanie: I know, goo thing my hallway isn't too long...but after I made sure a light was on all the way upstairs. I loved the SOS thing, it was so cool. Especially with all the little ...---...'s going on. (My ALT + 9 shortcut won't work.) I remember the Bloody Mary thing, I used to have to make sure the light was on, and not to even think about it. Something must have happened when the books fell...next section?

Gabbi: Oh, me too. (Oh, I'm Lynn by the way- welcome!)

Denise: Sometimes I accidentally forget that NR is real. Sometimes I lose track. I read all the footnotes, but if it says a chapter or exhibit I don't read it. I think my pages are the same...full color? Oh ,the characters feel so real. I liked those quotes. I think they all may be dead...well, in my copy it has the collage in the front, and there is a passage that has something along the lines of "kids" and "dead" or something? The check mark, it has something to do with something later (Wiki ruined it.) Yeah, I don't really think it was a totally big deal...hummm.

Karina: Oh, I hope you'll be able to get it!

Kim: Whoo page 27! Yes, the bs-ing is so good. Oh, I don't know, making it a longer amount of time will be okay with me.

Oh,yeah, the book, very good. Even if it's all made up it sounds so real...Kind of reminds me of The Amityville Horror, except that's supposed to be real...and the book- way better than the movie in my opinion.(There's a mention to that somewhere in a footnote in the next section, and The Shining, and a few more that I was like 'Oh, I read that!')

Ok I got stuck at the beginning of the next section and am totally bored but don't know why. *rolls eyes* I want to get to the good stuff. Yes, the footnotes and side bars are becoming a distraction and I admit I'm not reading them all.

Steph - believe me Mary Worth was NOT gonna hand me cookies, she was a scary mo fo. And why is she still there since he's gone in after the others? oh, is that the next section. sorry.

Yay Lynn for joining in. Damn Wiki!!!

Kim - It's ok. Page 27 is keeping up. I think once you get into it you'll read quicker cause it gets hard to put down. Plus you can always add your comments as you are going, even if you are behind.

*Steph - I know you are reading, where are you?