Posted this on the fantasy subreddit a bit ago and figured I might as well post it here too, in my endless effort to convert strangers into fans of this series.
Danielewski's name is mainly invoked in the context of his book House of Leaves, the sprawling story of a man whose house is bigger on the inside than the outside, told through the fragments of a literary critique of a film that doesn't exist, interspersed with footnotes written by the man who'd found and compiled the document as he slowly loses his mind. It's inventive, it's unique, it's a bit daunting, and it's absolutely worth a read.
But less frequently discussed is Danielewski's planned 27-volume series, The Familiar, about a girl who finds a cat, and two scientists on the run for discoveries they've made, and a drug addict in Singapore who's an assistant to a witch, and…. on and on it goes. There are nine viewpoint characters, each with their own distinct page layout, font, and syntax in true Danielewski style, from Anwar and Astair whose thoughts branch and fragment into paranthetical statements that can get almost a dozen deep, to Jingjing whose addict's brain renders his narrative virtually incomprehensible half the time. The story sprawls across the world, from the domestic to the criminal to the supernatural, most characters and their individual stories having little overlap with any of the others, at least early on in the series.
Danielewski uses formatting in a way hardly anyone else does; he makes art out of characters, he shrinks the text on each page to be just a few words when he wants to make each one stand out, or he'll bury you under page after page of sentences written by someone who swallowed a dictionary and went back for seconds. Sometimes I think he gets just a bit too enamoured with how clever he's being, but there's no disputing that he's an incredible talent and often the way he constructs sentences and and structures paragraphs is enthralling. He can takes ten pages to have a character describe how a wastewater treatment plant works and keep you interested the entire time, just as well as he can write the jaded observations of a veteran police detective, or the conversation of a father and daughter over breakfast.
It's ambitious and unique, it can be difficult but the difficulty makes it rewarding. It lends itself to rereads as you slowly start to parse what's actually happening (which is often not obvious), especially Danielewski's style means that each 880 page book holds more like 300-400 pages worth of text. There's ideas on top of ideas, each book opens with a series of usually (as far as I can tell) unrelated experimental short stories, or vague hints at a vaster story just beyond the pages.
But for all that, the real heart of the story is quite close to home. Three of the nine main characters are Xanther, an awkward, unwell, but endessly kind teenage girl, and her mother and father, Astair and Anwar. Danielewski writes these characters with so much feeling; Xanther's worries about the cost her health is having on her parents, Anwar's love for his daughter and his fear of being unable to provide for his family, Astair's struggles with the death of her ex-husband and her feelings of distance from Anwar, her attempt to balance the effort caring for Xanther requires while not further driving a wedge between her and her younger twin sisters, who resent the attention she gets. The characters are beautifully realized and conveyed, and this quiet domestic story somehow doesn't feel out of place at all when the story turns to the cat that may be a cosmic evil or a scientist using a crystal ball to scry the past.
Now of course the caveat to me making this recommendation to you is yes, there are only 5 books released of planned 27, the last one in 2016 or 2017, and no indication that the series will be continued. I contend, however, that the experience of these books is absolutely worth it anyway. They're exciting and weird and unlike anything else out there, and I think it's a true case of 'journey before destination.' I don't know where the story would have gone, or how everything would have been pulled together, but I kind of suspect the answer is it wouldn't have been. The joy of it isn't in finding out what happens, but by the way it happens, and experiencing the weird tangents Danielewski takes you on along the way. It's weird and it's hard to understand and it may never be done, but you should read it anyway.
And beyond everything else, these books are just gorgeous. It's probably the most impressive and beautiful layout and design for books I've ever seen.
by shadowninja2_0