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Lanark The night I began reading Lanark I ran into the living room and declared to Kenan, "This is the best book I have ever read!" He looked unconvinced. "What page are you on?" "Ten." "Ten." "Yes. But I can already tell." He went back to playing SimCity. My instincts were right. Lanark really is one of the best books I have ever read. The book has no introductory section. It just dumps you into this bizarre reality and forces you to keep up. The world is some form of Scotland where the sun just doesn't come out anymore so the citizens have discarded any system of time. Some of the inhabitants have been disappearing. Others come down with strange skin disorders. One such disease is a scaly, black growth that slowly takes over the body. The character Lanark has arrived in this town, Unthank, but has no memory of his life before being on the train on his way here. He is obsessed with searching the sky for the sun. He also has an arm that is covered by the scaly disorder, and the arm seems to be doing things he's not aware of. Lanark's story continues, getting odder and odder until it's taken over by the story of Duncan Thaw, a completely normal boy growing up after World War II in a completely normal version of Scotland. I don't want to reveal any more of the plot because the surprise that comes with every page is a big part of the fun. Everything about this book is a delight. The odd structure, the disturbing illustrations, the completely unexpected twists the book takes. Alasdair Gray manages to hold the whole thing together, never straying too far, never betraying the reader's trust. It's wholly bizarre, but in a joyful kind of way. With each development, I found myself giggling. I shrieked with glee in the epilogue, which finds itself in the middle of book four. The book deals with big, serious issues, yet it never loses its lightness. It's an amazing accomplishment, and I haven't stopped gushing about the book since I read it. I find myself using all the words you find in blurbs that I hate so very
much. "Lush." "Explosive." "Dazzling." "Saucy." "Delicious." So very few
books deserve such high praise, but this is a book that does. 
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