Rating: 
Summary: Manages to overcome its flaws
Review: This book is actually two books in one--one good, one bad. The story of the eerie house, with an immense dark space inside, like the immense, surreal world of dreams contained within each of us that is at the same time larger than the brain that contains it, is excellent, in spite of the second story's--the tattooer's apprentice/editor--worst efforts. The edginess and aspirations of the avant garde and the onion-skin layering of plots are interesting but, frankly, unnecessary. Ditto the warped page layouts that creep in as the book gets thicker--Shakespeare managed to write volumes of brilliance without once feeling the need to resort to typographical gimmicks. Nevertheless, the story is good enough to tell itself over the din of BS that Danielewski tries to drown it out with. It is one of the best newer books I've read. If Truant had been truant from its pages, it might have been one of the best books I've ever read.
Rating: 
Summary: Really weird...I loved it
Review: What is this book, anyway? Something like a strange hybrid of a horror thriller and a post-modern literary mosaic. Some people have come away from this book finding it cluttered, pretentious and pointless, but I had the opposite feeling: that I was reading genius. At few points in the "narrative" does this book begin to bore; usually, it holds the reader's attention with its clever textual apparatus, multiple narrators and commentators, mock-intellectual discourse, not to mention the actual subject matter: a house whose secrets are, apparently, too horrific to divulge in full. I am not an expert on experimental fiction of this type and I don't know how much Danielewski is indebted to his forerunners (some reviewers have accused him of liberal borrowing). Undoubtebly, though, the best book I've read in the past year.
Rating:
Summary: Chris Tucker
Review: A metaphor that comes to mind when describing this book involves Chris Tucker from the movie Rush Hour. That's right. Chris Tucker. He stands, like the reader, braced for a fight with fists cocked when his is struck by an unidentified assailant. Disoriented, he asks, "Which one of y'all kicked me?" This scene is a little like reading this book, equal parts, funny, disorienting and somehow, very realistic.
This is a book that is truly awful in the original etymological sense of the word. It is a work that is full of awe and inspires awe. Awful. I found myself hurtled through its pages, bounced back and forth through its copious footnotes as I watched the book itself unfold, violently rejecting categorization or description, demanding to be held at arms length, defining itself in terms of itself as truly alive and truly novel.
I am reminded of another book as real and powerful (complete with different colored print and fully engaged character who reads a story and becomes part of the story) Michael Ende's Never Ending Story.
Many of the reviewers here have decided this work is unoriginal, but I have to say that even if Danielewski has not invented the form, he excels at it and uses it to tell a horrifying story, convey some great essayistic points and to tell several great stories which are ultimately synthesized into one great book.
Rating: 
Summary: Not thanks...
Review: What a really weird book and so damn hard to read. I gave up. I only read part of the story then sold the book used. I thought the content would be more interesting and a good story. So far from it for me. Couldn't really follow all the jumble of the story, I think they just wanted to put together a "cool" book.
Rating: 
Summary: Good, not great
Review: While I enjoyed this book, I can't say that this is "fiction that makes all others seem less important." Having unique, changing type-face is not new: William Gass & Georges Perec. The story itself of HOL is reminiscent of Nabokov's Pale Fire & Jorge Luis Borges' Ficciones or Labyrinth. The relationship of Reader Writer Character is tested in most of these works, usually involving a corrupted or unreliable narrator (with exception of Perec).
The book is good, I just don't think it has "perfected" anything, or that it is "eons" ahead of all fiction. Mr. Danielewski has written a solid, entertaining book with glimpses into the horror & isolation within man's heart & mind. A solid 3 stars (I rarely give anything more than three).
Rating:
Summary: Horror for the thinking person
Review: Just flipping through the pages of this novel could give you a headache, but it's one of the most intriguing books to come out in the last few years, maybe the decade.The book is presented as a work written by a fictional blind man named Zapano who dies and leaves behind this tome, which is in turn edited and researched by a pretty weird cat who lives in his building, who in turn has the book published. What's this merry-go-round book about? It's a factual study of the phenomenon concerning the release of a home video by a noted photographer which shows that the house he and his family has moved into is strangely larger on the inside than it is on the outside. When doors and hallways start appearing in the house out of nowhere that lead to impossibly large and creepy places, the fun really begins and the true power of the book starts to reveal itself: its a damn creepy read. So creepy and surreal that it has you checking your own closets and doors, I'm not kidding. The audacity of the author is apparant in a mere flipping of the pages: there are footnotes to passages that go on for pages, some research, but some mere personal musings and stories by the editor. There are pages written sideways. There are pages with one word on them. Everywhere the word "house" appears it is printed in blue ink. There are letters in the back written by the institutionalized mother of the original editor. In other words, it ain't no weekend book. I'm not going to lie to you: I don't even get it all. As it turns out, you need to bone up on your Norse mythology a little bit to get all of the author's meanings, but I didn't and still got a hell of a charge from it. I was able to superimpose what I thought was going on and it made it even more personal and creepy for me. This book is like "The Amityville Horror" written by Albert Einstein. Not for the faint of intelligence.
Rating:
Summary: More than a mere novel...
Review: I can't stand it when people dismiss the House of Leaves as a mere novel, or an unconventional plot/approach to story telling, or nothing more than incoherent scraps thrown together and labeled a book. The House of Leaves is eons ahead of our time. The book is a work of genius. Sure, the surface is composed of squigly lines, hopping storylines, and unconventionally printed pages, but this book requires a deeper understanding. Despite what everyone says about random thoughts thrown in here and there, I really believe that Danielewski wrote his book with the principle of logographic neccessity in mind...or that principle in which every word is in its right place, at the right time, in the right way. Is it fair for one to write off a book as a waste of time, because things just dont seem to fit? I dont think so. House of Leaves is not an easy read. In order to fully comprehend its scope, and the amazing talent of Danielewski, it's imperative that it be studied. I guess that sounds pretty ridiculous, considering how this book is meant as a means of entertainment...but the book raises serious issues,like perspectives on things, the nature of things (ie, the house, the characters, the text), and the purpose of it all. Read this book. Study It. Make it your bible. Danielewski has great things to say.
Rating:
Summary: This is for you
Review: There are more than two hundred reviews here at Amazon on this book, many of them quite detailed, so I will only add a few minor comments. First, the plot reminded me of the classic Lovecraft short story called "The Rats in the Walls", which also dwells on the universal childhood fantasy of discovering a parallel universe under the basement of one's home (see also "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" by C.S.Lewis). Of course, what sets "House of Leaves" apart is its very original form, with many levels of text and literally dozens of narrators, ranging from the main characters which are also narrative voices (Zampanò and Johnny Truant), to short one-time commentaries from fictitious "sources". Johnny's story is a very sad one and in my opinion it reveals the central theme of HoL: loss, or lack: lack of love, of life, of meaning. Near the end of the book, there is a very funny passage in which many real authors and personalities comment on the "Navidson Record" and I think that Danielewski is here paying tribute to his main influences. One of them is Douglas Hofstadter, and anyone who has read "Gödel, Escher, Bach" knows about his penchant for codes, hidden texts, acronyms and the like. In HoL hidden messages also abound, sometimes encoded in the first letters of the words in a sentence. I have a guess, still only an unproven hypothesis, that there is a hidden message in every sentence where the word "house" appears (always in blue), or at least in those where the word "house" is a little shifted up or down (pay attention to this). I think that the author hints at it when he reveals the "Thamyris" transcription. If you have read HoL and think that my theory is right, please e-mail me. If you have not read it, what are you waiting for?! It is a walk on the wild side of literature.
Rating:
Summary: The trip of books.
Review: This book tears you down into a world unthinkable. I just plainly enjoyed the utter complexity of the writing and composition of the book. But remember it is a novel in the fiction section.
Rating:
Summary: THE House of Leaves
Review: I have never read a piece of work, that was actually haunting before. We've read ghost stories that raise goose bumps or makes you think of that thing you can't see when the lights go out, but The House of Leaves, is more than that. The book becomes the house in your hands. It's twists and turns leaves the reader, really twisting and turning. Reading this book is a commitment of forever, that few, if any stories ever acheive.
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