/lit/ - Literature

Books that take place on Halloween

I finally got around to reading 'CotC,' and let me tell you, it's easily the most experimental novel I've come across since 'House of Leaves.' It's funny because going in, I thought it would be full of memes, but it's actually a pretty intense horror story. I'm not even sure why it got memed so much in the first place. And to anons who are nitpicking its grammar, I think they might be missing the point. The wonky grammar is actually a really unique storytelling device that I don't think has ever been tried before. It's pure genius, and it adds a whole new layer to the story. All in all, it's a fantastic read and the best thing I've read from /lit./

Is this the only one of the meme books that is actually fun to read? The ending felt like an acid trip from hell and I loved it

Pic related takes place on Halloween

Not even Gardner’s later books can top the undisputed classic this is

The most influential book of the decade

It’s pic related

Cast the inevitable Netflix adaptation

What am I in for?

Which of F Gardner’s books is the greatest?

Why is Call of the Crocodile so much more popular than the other 15 books in Horror’s Call?

Which book by F Gardner has the best twist ending?

Sneed

Yes. Pic related.

Hard mode

How did F Gardner become the most famous author of all time?

>An entire board of writers and this is the most famous piece of literature produced from here.

I fucking love this place. Also this turned out to be a riot to read. Thanks /lit/.

>>21559536
It’s this book. 4chan used to have ads for it for free copies.

"Call of the Crocodile" is the first installation in Gardner's breakout series of horror novels. The story follows its protagonist, a young boy named Faggot Gardner (no relation to F. Gardner, the author), as he searches the grimy streets of Chicago for "the Crocodile", a local leather daddy notorious for putting bad little boys like Gardner in their place.
Young Faggot Gardner searches high and low for the fabled dominant: in dilapidated crack dens, in public restrooms, in subterranean glory holes. Yet no matter how assiduously he searches, how quickly he moves from clue to clue, how many dirty men's toes he sucks (an activity constantly referred to in the novel as "pussing the boots"), Gardner seems always to be one step behind the object of his obsessive desire.
The twist comes near the end of the novel, during a scene reminiscent of Polanski's "Repulsion", where the beautiful Carole, played by a young Catherine Deneuve, finally descends into madness, and hallucinates human arms reaching oot of the walls of her apartment and grabbing her, thereby externalizing her fear not only of sexual assault, but of any form of intimate contact whatsoever. F. Gardner (the author) parodies this scene, effectively turning its tone and implications upside down, by having his protagonist, the now cock-starved and desperate Faggot Gardner (again, no relation) crawl on his knees through a dark apartment, groping along the walls to find his way, only to feel, poking proudly oot of the holes in the walls, not scary arms with grabby hands, but dozens of diamond-hard dicks. They poke him in the eyes. They shoot gobs of bitter gravy into his nose and ears. They wag reproachfully at him, like the index fingers of the stern private school teachers who buggered him in his earliest childhood memories, as he slowly makes his way to the end of the hall. The twist is this: when he finally reaches the end of the hall, and opens the door there, he finds himself staring into a blinding white light. He believes that when his eyes finally adjust to the glare, he will see there, waiting for him, horse-whip in hand, croc-skin chaps pulled snugly against his obese thighs, the man he has been seeking for so many days, seeking, in a way, for all of his life. But instead what he sees is a hospital room. He is lying in a hospital bed. The bright light is coming from the naked bulb above him. There is a nurse at his side, changing his IV fluids.
"Where am I?" he asks.
"Loretto Hospital," the nurse replies.
"I was eaten by a crocodile, wasn't I?" he asks.
"No," she says. "You were violently assaulted by hundreds of corpulent and diseased men, with disgusting rotten teeth and putrid breath. That's why you smell like corpses and semen."
"No," he says firmly. "I was eaten by a crocodile. It caused my family to go insane. I'm going to write a novel aboot it, and force people to read it."
"Whatever you say, Faggot," the nurse replies.

How do F Gardner’s new books compare to CotC?