The House of Writers

by M.J. Nicholls

Fiction. THE HOUSE OF WRITERS is a playful novel set in 2050, when the publishing industry has collapsed, literature has become a micro-niche interest, and Scotland itself has become an enormous call center. Those writers who remain reside in a dilapidated towerblock, where they churn out hack works tailored to please their small audiences. The novel weaves together individual stories of life inside (and outside) the building, where each floor houses a different genre, as the writers fight to keep the process of literature alive with varying degrees of success. THE HOUSE OF WRITERS is a feast of wit: a surreal entertainment, a bracing satire, a verbal tour- de-force, and a good-spirited dystopian comedy; it is also a loving homage to language, literature, and the imagination, and a plea that they remain vital well into the dubious future that awaits us.

Genres: Fiction, Dystopia, Books About Books, Science Fiction, British Literature, Literature, Contemporary

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2016

About the author

A man who wrote the novels A Postmodern Belch, The House of Writers, The Quiddity of Delusion, The 1002nd Book to Read Before You Die, Scotland Before the Bomb, Trimming England and Condemned to Cymru. He lives in Glasgow.

Reviews

[Fionnuala]

-This is a book for book people.
-What do you mean by ‘book people’? Anyone who reads books must be a book person surely?
-No, I mean more than that. I mean people who read a lot...
-Many people read a lot.
-It’s not just about reading a lot. I’m not sure how to express it..it’s that they live to read and they read to live. That’s what I mean, I think..
-That sounds a bit extreme. Who'd want to be a writer for such ‘book people’? Wouldn’t they be inclined to criticize everything they read, what with all that intense ‘living for books’ stuff going on?
-Oh no, I think 'book people' are the perfect readers for a certain kind of writer, and I’d count the author of this book in that group.
-So you're saying there’s a special group of ‘writer people’ too.
-Exactly. Writers who know how to open up the narrative and invite the readers in.
-You mean metafiction? Loads of writers do that.
-It's more than that. It’s as if they not only acknowledge the reader’s presence, and therefore the fictional nature of the narrative, but they show him how it is done, the inner workings, allowing the reader to be present as the book gets written, as this bit is tweaked and that bit reworked.
-Hmm, like being in an artist’s studio as he paints a picture?
-Yes, sort of. Painting is actually a good example. We are all used to the kind of art where the surface is all there seems to be. We only get to see the ‘finished’ product. The artist doesn’t choose to reveal the stages the painting went through in the making. He hides all that. The painting fills the canvas right to the edges and there’s little hint of any self-questioning, hesitation or rethink along the way.
-So?
-Then there’s another kind of art where the artist doesn’t care if we see the traces of the colour he began with but mostly painted over, or the object he changed his mind about but which we can see in shadow, or the blanks in the canvas which he didn’t paint at all. It’s finished but ‘unfinished’. There’s room for the viewer to imagine things in it, to turn away and come back and then see other things entirely, to really participate in it, not just glance at it and walk on by.
-And this writer’s book is like that, you think?
-Yes, he definitely belongs to the group of writers who allow the reader to participate in the reading.
-So, I’m curious, how did you participate in the reading of this book?
-For a start, I kind of watched myself reading it. I know that’s bizarre but I did.
-You’re right, it is bizarre and a little incomprehensible.
-The updates I posted while reading bear me out, as well as the comments I made on those updates. It was like an out-of-body experience. There was the 'me' who was reading and commenting, and then there was the 'me' who was inside the narrative, walking about touching everything, lifting things up to examine them from underneath.
-But what if this was just your particularly quirky way of reading, and nothing at all to do with the book. Other readers might not read it that way - they might just look at the surface and pass on.
-I don't think there’s any way to give this book only a ‘surface’ read. I think you'd fail to read it if you tried. The writer works hard to draw you in. In fact, he’s watching you read the book. You have a thought while reading a certain bit and then he tells you that thought. It’s a strange experience but quite fascinating.
-Now you’re just being absurd. Listen, I can’t sit around all day indulging your inanities. I’ve got updates to read, links to click on. In fact I’ve got better reviews to read and comment on, if you must know..
-But wait. The word 'absurd' is important. While I was reading this book, I took a bet with someone that I’d find parallels between it and the other books I was reading, and I did.
-Make an absurd bet and you’re bound to get an absurd result, I’d say.
-But the author actually mentions one of the writers I was reading, and I discovered that his previous book has been compared to the other author I’ve been reading. And those are just the most obvious connections.
-Ok. Enough with the silly mysteries. What exactly are you saying?
-I’m saying that I found elements in this book that reminded me of aspects of both Flann O’Brien’s writing and Rabelais’ writing. For example, the author loves alphabetical lists and wordplay just as Rabelais does, and he has a way of turning ordinary statements around to show how ridiculous they are the way O’Brien does...
-What’s the name of this book again? The House of Writers? And you only found echoes of two writers in it? I think you’ve been sleeping on the job. I’m sure I’d find dozens of names in there.
-You would, you would! But would you know what the author meant when he included them? Who he was inspired by and who he was satirising?
-Enough! I know when I’m being insulted. You’re saying I’m not one of your precious ‘book people’. Well that’s just fine because I’d never want to ‘live for books’, thank you very much. I’ve got better things to do with my time. Click.

[MJ Nicholls]

THIS NOVEL IS AVAILABLE TO BUY NOW. FROM AMAZON. BECAUSE I AM WILLING TO SUSPEND MY DISLIKE OF CORPORATE MONOLOPY IN THE CASE OF MY OWN BOOKS. OR, YOU CAN ORDER FROM INDIE SELLERS HERE. IF YOU LIVE IN THE UK, MESSAGE ME FOR A PERSONALLY SIGNED COPY.

Advance Praise Bought remarks on The House of Writers:

“A ho-hum gallimaufry of stop-start narratives, banal tangents, and boorish satirical pokes.” — Harold Sorrentino

“Hey, man! Thanks for transferring the £50. You want me to ramble on about your novel’s kickassitude? Sure. It’s sitting on the bookcase, man. I have priorities, like Franzen’s and DeLillo’s latest. I like you, man, but I ain’t bumping those two LEGENDS for your little scribbling. Anyway, use this: MJ ROCKS AND THIS IS MUCH BETTER THAN THAT JUVENILE EFFORT WITH BELCH IN THE TITLE. PEACE.” — @davey46

“The nadir of attempted comedy.” — Lydia Theroux

“Mr. Nicholls, I have read this latest novel submission with interest. Thank you for sending the other manuscripts, Publish This You Cretins, Your Publishing Firm is a Tide of Effluent, Everything You Publish I Ignore on Principle. I will assign those to our intern readers. I would like to make a personal comment: why the bitterness? This novel is simply a brutal outpouring of personal grievances, score-settling resentments, and misanthropic moans about the world’s refusal to crown you a genius. I am afraid we cannot publish this.” — A Man at Penguin Books

“This novel is a crisp, buttery concoction that tantalises the mind . . . a soft and mouthwatering crunch of pleasure tingling on the cortices and yumming up the imagination.” — Gregg’s Bakers

“Dear Mark, I have had a look at some of your book now. I’m afraid that it isn’t my thing. Good luck with it. […] Just to send you a few more words … there were some things I liked in your MS, it’s just that a blurb needs to be a real affirmation and I feel uneasy offering that here I’m afraid. Please don’t be too disheartened and make sure you keep writing.” — Alex Kovacs

“This is a pleasant, amusing, moving, and engaging novel written by a talented person.” — CheapBlurbs4U

“Mark. I’m sorry, but I had to skip that nine-page list. It went on far too long. Why didn’t you make it easier for the reader? I’m sorry, but I couldn’t really understand what the book was about. Your father is reading the Jack Reacher novels, why don’t you write something like that?” — Mrs Nicholls

“Labyrinthine satiric masterpiece . . . destined for a place in the pantheon of eternal pleasures” — M.J. Nicholls

“Arno Schmidt’s Republica Intelligensia this is not.” — Annoying Zappa Fan

“In which the [...] author [...] reverts to pretentious metafictional form. [C]omes in under 350 pages [...] which will disappoint the post-grads, archivists, hacks and noddies from the “is long, is good” knitting circle who will find nothing else to praise but the derivative cover design. My copy remains unpaid for and, of course, unread.” — Eeyan Grayhairz, The Bloated Review

“My sexual jealousy aside, my crazed surges of uncontrollable lust towards the author aside, I think this novel I haven’t read is terrible. I despise it so much, especially the derivative jejune banal commonplace hackneyed shop-soiled clichéd threadbare cover art, and I hate the publisher, which the author established with his own money in New Jersey merely in order to publish himself. This flagrant attention-seeking is embarrassing. Read me instead! Check out these links. I am masturbating as I write this.” — Bloatus Maximumus, The Infinite Review

Page 219:

I am the author of this novel and I have lied to you, and taken unhealthy pleasure in lying to you, and I will continue to lie to you until you beg for more. I have lied about everything in my real life (which does not exist—even as the “author” I am a construct invented to represent aspects of the “real” author—however, let’s not tangle ourselves in semantic or metaphysical notions. I have lied my way through life, relishing in the saltiest untruths. When people have asked me, “Is that soup made of string?”, I have replied, “No. That soup is made of soup.” I have told many dirty, unfair lies, and I have delighted in every one. The truth is a pointless concept, invented by non-writers to keep the masses logical and docile, to eliminate the pleasures of fiction-making. Punch the truth hard.

[Manny · Rating 4 out of 5]

A Near Near Death Experience

I found myself rising through a misty tunnel towards a white light, at first slowly, then with increasing speed. As I ascended, I felt the bonds that connected me to the everyday world grow weaker and weaker. I looked down, and I could see my body beneath me, but now it seemed unimportant, as though it belonged to someone I didn't even know. All around, I heard an unearthly music. This continued for a time I could not measure, until I unexpectedly emerged into what looked like a larger edition of the Geneva Cantonal Tax Office. I was at the end of a long line, which snaked towards a desk at the far end of the room.

"Where am I?" I whispered to the person in front of me. He seemed familiar. I realised it was my old Goodreads friend BirdBrian.

"We're dead, aren't we?" I asked. BirdBrian shrugged.

"Well, in that case," I said, feeling for some reason that etiquette required it, "I'm sorry for all those those things I said about Donald Trump. Maybe you were right after all."

"Maybe not," said BirdBrian with a hint of embarrassment. "He does in fact appear to have started World War III."

Looking at the other people in the line, I now noticed that many of them had a distinctly charred and radioactive appearance. I cast about for some way to change the subject, but found to my relief that we had already reached the registration desk. Several fat and self-important angels with clipboards were taking notes.

"Next!" called the one closest to me. "Now, who are you?" I gave my name. "And what did you do on Earth?" the angelic bureaucrat continued.

"I like to think I was a writer," I mumbled. The angel smirked at one of his colleagues; another hid his eyes behind his wing. I stared.

"Did you see that?" I whispered to BirdBrian. "He hid his eyes behind his wing! This is Writer's Heaven!"

BirdBrian shrugged again. "I never much liked The Waste Land," he said. But I didn't care.

"Please!" I said, turning back to the angels. "If this is Writer's Heaven, tell me more about it!" The first one, who seemed to be the leader, cleared his throat.

"Actually," he began in an unexpectedly apologetic tone, "I should say now that you may find it a little disappointing."

"Disappointing?" I asked, confused. The angel switched on a projector and opened a PowerPoint presentation; pulling out a laser pointer, he began a lecture he had clearly given many times before.

"You must understand," he said, "that we started off wanting to do this right. We had big plans. We brought in Jorges Luis Borges - nothing but the best, you understand! - and we asked him to construct the Library of Babel. We didn't just want you writers to have every book ever written. We wanted you to have every book that ever could be written."

"Sounds terrific," I agreed. The angel gave me a withering glance.

"The problem," he said, "the problem, as we would have realized if only we'd read Señor Borges' story more carefully, is that virtually all the books that could be written are complete gibberish. Even if you had the whole of eternity to read them - as, you will no doubt have gathered, you do - you would not have the patience to search until you found a paragraph, nay, even a sentence, that you found the least bit interesting."

"Well, uh, I suppose--" I began. The angel cut me off. "Unfortunately", he said, "we had already invested so much of our budget in the Library scheme that there was hardly anything left when we were forced to change plans. We had to radically downsize. It was tough, but we decided in the end that we would just commission a decaying tower block full of neurotic hacks who would churn out substandard genre fiction without pause, for ever."

"Um--" I said. The angel, now speaking very quickly and flipping through the slides at a prodigious rate, wrapped up.

"As I said," he gabbled, "as I said, we started with the best of intentions, but it was impossible to ignore the budgetary constraints. We have rules. So, to cut a long story short, in the end we decided to outsource the whole thing to a Glaswegian tosser called M.J. Nicholls. He said he could deliver on schedule for 10% less than the next closest bidder. He wouldn't actually build the decaying tower block or hire any of the writers, he'd just write a novel about them, but it would be as good as. As good as. And that's what you're going to get to read. Until the End of Time. His book. It's quite a decent piece of work you know."

"I hate to ask," I said hesitantly after a long pause, "but -- but is this really Heaven?"

Then I woke up.

Some Books That House of Writers Resembles

A Postmodern Belch, but less eructative; Infinite Jest, but without the footnotes and the tennis; Ulysses, but without the Irishness and the stream-of-consciousness; Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, but without the androids; A rebours, but less fin-de-siècle; the collected works of J.G. Ballard, but not collected and not by J.G. Ballard; Gargantua et Pantagruel, but with more lists; A Clockwork Orange, but more violent; Trainspotting, but less tasteful; La disparition, but with more occurrences of the letter 'e'; Twilight, but not YA, not about vampires, not based on Jane Austen and not at all.

A Class Action Suit

LORD JUSTICE COCKLECARROT: Mr M.J. Nicholls and Sagging Meniscus Press, I put it to you that on the 15th of August 2016 you did with malice aforethought and in full cognizance of your actions publish a book entitled The House of Writers which did willfully insult, libel, demean, belittle and calumniate the reputations of Nick Hornby, Jonathan Franzen, Alison Bechdel, E.L. Doctorow, David David Katzman, Zadie Smith, Muriel Barbery, Nick Hornby, Jessica Treat, David Eggars, Marjane Satrapi, Anthony Vacca, Amélie Nothomb, Ian Rankin, Vernon D. Burns, Nick Hornby, Jodie Picoult, William H. Gass, Jonathan Safran Foer, Ben Marcus, Nicole Krauss, Miranda July, Manny Rayner, Michel Houellebecq, J.K. Rowling and Nick Hornby. How do you plead?

COUNSEL FOR THE DEFENCE: Objection! The list just presented mentions Nick Hornby four times, whereas the book in question in fact insults him five times. Hence on the principle of expressio unius est exclusio alterius, not to mention ex specialis derogat legi generali, I submit that the charges laid against my client be deemed null and void.

COCKLECARROT: Objection sustained.

MJ NICHOLLS: Can I countersue?

COCKLECARROT: Quit while you're ahead kid. Case dismissed.

[Arthur Graham · Rating 5 out of 5]

The House of Readers:

First Floor
Housing readers who automatically five-star anything written by their friends, no matter how atrocious.

Second Floor
Housing readers who automatically one-star anything written by their enemies, no matter how brilliant.

Third Floor
Housing readers leading sad, empty lives, compensating for this by attacking any reader with a slight variance in opinion.

Fourth Floor
Housing readers leading sad, empty lives, compensating for this by effusively agreeing with any reader who shares their opinion.

Fifth Floor
Housing readers who habitually round up their ratings for various arbitrary reasons.

Sixth Floor
Housing readers who habitually round down their ratings for various arbitrary reasons.

Seventh Floor
Housing readers who mostly just bitch about the lack of a .5 star option.

Eighth Floor
Housing readers who must prefer Twitter or Facebook for some reason, having not been on Goodreads for several months to many years.

Ninth Floor
Housing readers who approach Goodreads as more of a dating site, limiting their friends to attractive readers of the opposite sex.

Tenth Floor
Housing readers who float old book reviews from seven years ago because they haven't written anything better since.

Eleventh Floor
Housing readers who do not read the reviews written by other readers, but still "like" them anyway, in the hopes of garnering "likes" for themselves.

Twelfth Floor
Housing readers who have ten times as many friends as books.

Thirteenth Floor
Housing readers who have only read To Kill a Mockingbird and/or Slaughterhouse-Five.

Fourteenth Floor
Housing readers who spend all day debating books such as Gone Girl On a Train vs. A Something of Something and Something vs. What I Talk About When I Talk About Talking About This Or That Other Thing from the safety of their parents' basements.

Fifteenth Floor
Housing readers who love Fifty Shades of Grey and "anything James Patterson."

Sixteenth Floor
Housing racist, sexist readers who won't read anything that isn't by a white male author.

Seventeenth Floor
Housing racist, sexist readers who won't read anything that is by a white male author.

Eighteenth Floor
Housing readers who only review in memes and GIFs.

Nineteenth Floor
Housing readers who take it personal and make it personal, assuming the worst possible intentions behind every comment.

Twentieth Floor
Housing readers who are apparently incapable of posting an actual review of a book they read.

Twenty-first Floor
Housing readers who hypocritically criticize other readers for behaviors they've been known to engage in from time to time themselves.

WHICH FLOOR(S) DO YOU LIVE ON???

WHICH FLOOR(S) DID I FORGET???

[Glenn Russell]

My initial acquaintance with MJ's distinctive way with words occurred when I was forcefully struck by these lines as part of our singular Scotsman's incisive review on Théophile Gautier's Mademoiselle de Maupin:

"Your plot antics are bare: a poet looking for his perfect Venus encounters hurdles in his search, finding no luck in the pink-cheeked Rosette whom he diddles for five months out of kindness. When he claps eyes on the girlish man Theodore (who happens to be a woman, but ssshhh) he finds his Venus par excellence and goes stark raving mad like all melodramatic romantic poets who want to mainline beauty into their veins."

Double wow, thinks I, "goes stark raving mad like all melodramatic romantic poets who want to mainline beauty into their veins" - what a fabulous, spot-on image, one that I wouldn't come up with if I was given a thousand cracks.

And after many other occasions to feast my glazzies on signature MJ linguistic razzle-dazzle here in book review land, I knew I'd be in for a plethora of phenomenal phonemic pleasures with The House of Writers.

Since it is now 2021 and House of Writers published back in 2016, why, you may ask, did it take me so long to get to this dance of twenty-six squigs? The answer is clear: I needed a good kick in the arse, a powerful kick-start to get me started - and I got said kick recently by reading another exuberant writer, actually one of our greatest living writers, a writer who's on that highly rarefied Nabakovian linguistic vibe: Rodrigo Fresán from Argentina.

Anyway, here I am. And I'm here to echo other loves of quality lit, reviewers like Fionnuala, Arthur, Ted (RIP), Anthony, Lee, Vit, Geoff and Nathan "N.R." Gaddis, who are over the moon about THOW. Among the many memorable reviewer quotes, take a lasting look as this one by Fionnuala:

"I’m saying that I found elements in this book that reminded me of aspects of both Flann O’Brien’s writing and Rabelais’ writing. For example, the author loves alphabetical lists and wordplay just as Rabelais does, and he has a way of turning ordinary statements around to show how ridiculous they are the way O’Brien does..."

And this one from Vit:

"If Bible is the book of books then The House of Writers is the pun of puns… The House of Writers is an ultimate postmodern opus because it boasts a record number of allusions per page of text…"

And yet again, this one from David citing HQLF (High Quality Literary Fiction):

"This book is world-class. It is one for the ages. So if you give even a brass farthing for the state of the quality of serious literature to be read by your children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, then take a lesson from "The House of Writers" and support HQLF wherever you may find it, like here."

For me, reading MJ's multifaceted, flavorful fiction brought to mind many of Raymond Queneau's exercises numbering ninety-nine - Nichollish too-rah-rah-ray spinning anagrams, onomatopoeia, alexandrines, syncope, paragoge and others that I'm sure went way over my not so linguistically nimble head.

With this in mind, I'll end by sharing a batch of scrumptious eye-catching quotes (I'll also include the title of the chapter where they came from) that might serve as your own kick-start to put your paws on MJ's post-Belcher:

THIS LEXICOGRAPHICALLY LIMBER UNIVERSE
"Are you skilled with words in an age when words are squanderously piddled down so many unthinking drains? Are you a spinner of yarns, a whirler of sagas, a rotator of epics? Do you take pride in the sibilant syllable, the luxuriant noun, the plosively placed preposition, in sentences that sing like angels in a cosmic opera?"

"Can you fill a blank page with enough razzle-dazzle, fuzzbox, and too-rah-rah-ray to make the everyday reader spurn his duncehood?"

MHAIRI
"Several writers (ex-smackheads) noticed and I had to deal with begging requests from those hoping to have their pages sprinkled with extra helpings of Big H - to turn them into instant bestsellers."

"I made a home for myself on the roof, paying a simpleton named Gerald (more on him later) to construct a small cottage overlooking the wastelands of Crarsix. If I tilt my head heavenwards on summer nights, I can glimpse a rogue star through the carcinogenic layers of toxic silt, and my heart is almost happy."

A BLAST OF KIRSTY
"As the world reverted back to a sub-hominid mental state, Scot-Call switchboards were abuzz with operatives taking on nonsensical and Cro-Magnon queries - behind these the dominant question: "Can you help me live? Over 98% of inbound queries we deal with are pointless, and since real enlightenment is a danger to the Scot-Call profit margins, we encourage operatives to devise baffling and unhelpful answers to keep people calling."

"Having said that, I prefer my torment localised. I look forward to many years torturing workers with the prospect of bonuses, raising their hopes for months on end, sacking them the day before their bonuses are due. That's the sort of buzz I crave as I work my way to the upper echelons of this magnificently evil empire."

PUFF: THE UNLOVED SON
"Satisfied that this pipe was the fattest of those he'd inserted fingers into, disappointed he couldn't insert his other hand into the pipe without going splat on the concrete, Puff shimmied back toward the windows."

"The other writers sincerely didn't want Puff to plummet and had brought blood to her tongue and scrunched her toes so tight she strained a tendon. Puff shimmied along the pipe and dropped back through the window unscathed."

THIS
"Some books obfuscate their intentions, drowning their meaning in multiple layers of ambiguities, subtleties, and intellectual mazes for the reader to unfurl. This is not one of those books."

"This one has a definite meaning and purpose, maybe, if I'm not lying, and you will not escape reading this novel without learning exactly what the author (me) intended exactly, unless I decide to lie to you, in which case, you won't."


Novelist M.J. Nicholls, born 1986

[Paul Bryant · Rating 4 out of 5]

INTERVIEWS WITH WRITERS WHO HAVE THEIR JAWS WIRED SHUT
No 5. M.J. NICHOLLS


[for the previous interviews with Will Self, Margaret Atwood, Salman Rushdie and Neil Gaiman see the archives located at youtube/user/jawswired]

PB:

First, thank you for participating in this interesting series of interviews with writers who have their jaws wired together. I hope you are reasonably comfortable in that contraption.

MJ :

Mmmsh.

PB:

I should explain to our readers, the jaw-wiring is just for the duration of the interview, the rest of the time these authors are entirely unwired and are able to talk freely. So, Mr Nicholls, your latest novel The House of Writers is a fairly broad comedy and yet contains a serious message.

MJ :

Fllg shhhrrw.

PB:

It’s set in the future when serious fiction has become reduced to a tiny niche interest, entirely swamped by the frenzied cacophony of popular culture. So it’s become something like reviving medieval goat breeds, which I understand a handful of enthusiasts like to do somewhere in Pennsylvania.

MJ :

Ngg.

PB:

There’s an implication here, which I should like to address. Are you saying that you are content with the privileged position serious fiction has been allocated in our past and even present cultural landscape? We note the yearly shenanigans surrounding the Booker Prize, Baileys Women’s Prize, Costa Book Award, Nobel, and so forth. There’s a terrific amount of kowtowing to these serious big shot writers, wouldn’t you say? And the implication is always that the poor bloody reader should be earnestly scuttling off to read the biggest, most serious book which will inevitably be one that out-jeremiads the last huge fat monstrosity?

MJ :

Grrt sht hllrrr, hllmmp ng ng dsss

PB:

I take that as a yes. So, you know, I’m just putting this out there, but wouldn’t it be at least some kind of change if for just a few short decades these tedious panjandrums were gathered up and crammed into an office block in Scotland and politely ignored for a few blissful decades.

MJ :

Gll hv hj dsssrss npt pt plllg!

PB:

Sorry?

MJ :

Gll hv hj dsssrss npt pt plllg! Pllg! Pllg!

PB:

I’m awfully sorry but I can’t tell a word you’re saying. I’m just saying, if you didn’t quite get my drift, that it’s possible – I’ll put it no stronger than that - that we would all be happier without this obsession with the big fat serious literary novel. Ironically, you use the form of an unserious novel to promote the idea that this ancient dying beast still has some mileage left in it. Or perhaps I’m reading you wrong?

MJ:

Gggt flll nssstst yff. Yff!!

PB:

Anyway, let me try a different tack. In 1973 Philip Stevick wrote a significant essay on the state of literature called “Scheherazade Runs Out of Stories, Goes On Talking” – meaning that authors had run out of original narratives and useful or interesting things to say about modern life, and now they were reduced to footling around with technique and style, abandoning the what for the how. Well, that was 40 odd years ago – do you think anything’s improved since then?

MJ :

Mff ggg hlmmp lmm fll zrrs

PB:

So Professor Stevick was saying that these serious writers had run out of ideas but still had an audience, and I think (underneath all the comedy) you are saying they still have ideas but now no audience.

MJ :

Glg.

PB:

Well, I see merit in both these positions but what I say is this : we all need wallpaper in our rooms. We all need a window. We have floor coverings, no naked boards full of splinters which can really hurt the soft undersides of your feet. And we have to have an alternative to the 6 o’clock news which isn’t a celebrity bake-off. The problem is that it’s almost impossible to find a serious author who has a shred of optimism left about the human race, and that’s kind of like having your wallpaper showing HD images of the Vietnam War. So I think that perhaps what you are saying is that that is the modern writer’s dilemma – to be serious without inducing suicidal thoughts in the reader. Would that be correct?

MJ :

Ggg ggg ggg hlp

PB:

Well, thanks very much for being here tonight Mr Nicholls. I wish your novel all the success it most certainly deserves. I laughed and didn’t cry at all. And the wealth of cultural references was nonpareil – Marmite, Beyonce, Kafka, Robert Fripp, the Incredible String Band, there is surely no living writer who doesn’t get a walk-on part somewhere, Lydia Lunch, Garbo, Devo, the severed head of Diana Ross, Laura Marling and the severed head of Jean-Luc Godard, amidst welters of others. After the whole show was over I collapsed and had to be revived with an oxygen mask and electrodes. Bravo. We can now unwire your jaws you’ll be glad to know.

[Ted · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reading this review will likely metamorphose you into a three-legged insect. Don’t say you weren’t warned.
F. Kafka


Glowing testimonials on the back cover from writers Lee Klein and David David Katzman. [Is it possible that Katzman would prefer a single ‘David’ when mentioned in a third-rate review like this? Perhaps to disguise his identity? If so, how could I possibly decide which ‘David’ to leave out? A disturbing question.]

The testimonials displayed on the handsomely designed cover, of an extremely handsome, high-quality paperback published by the handsomely named Sagging Meniscus. Inside, as further testimonial to the handsomeness of the entire publishing project, I spotted no more than a few typos in an obviously carefully proof-read narrative – though given the writing, an apparent typo could easily be intentional, and could have shot quite clear of this reader’s dome. [And let’s face it, even a mainstream best seller in these days is likely to have more typos than the number of ants marching across your kitchen floor following a heavy rain. Or for that matter, the number of typos (or worse) in a typical New York Times lead story - proofers and even editors having bit the dust of cost-cutting years ago. A remark which connects not at all curiously to the dystopian narrative penned by Mr. Nicholls.]

Now here’s where I feel obligated to say something about the story! I hate this part of a fiction review, hate it! Pressure to get it right, check this, that. Well I acquiesce, but only for three tweets of chars, a Status allowance. So, (not counting spaces)

Scotland, now ‘ScotCall’, bereft of any occupation save call answering – inane questions from simple people, run by giant co. ScotCall. Nature paved over, animated junk yards crawling with microwaves, phones, toasters, computer displays, all running broken code which has thrown society back to 1980s, all alive, sentient, dangerous. A tall block of apartments turned into The Writers House, a place where the few writers left are engaged in fantastic attempts to write books for the few readers le

That’s all you’ll get of accurate description, dammit! Now for fluffy opinion, personal reaction – not quite fake news.

The picaresque and ribald-humor-filled novel is a pleasure of constant surprises and guffaws, a tale stretching some 30-40 years into the future, perhaps signifying nothing but certainly not told by an idiot. The world now under the thumb of a few mega-corporations. Creepy, yes. A bit sad, yes. But more than anything else, downright funny, sometimes laugh-out-loud hilarious, as the author takes us on an outrageous journey, following several story lines that weave in and out, overlapping one another, ridiculous quests of ridiculous and/or desperate characters.

Nicholls has constructed a novel, post-post-modern (PPM), whose separate but related narratives can be read in any number of sequences. About 80 unnumbered chapters. Nine “sets” of chapters clearly related by title, then fifteen other chapters that seem to be one-offs. Each “set” is sprinkled throughout the book, with several other chapters in between each of the set chapters. This suggests the book can be read from first page to last; the nine sets of chapters could be read a set at a time, in any of 9! [362,880] orders. The one-offs could be read in any of 14! [don’t ask] orders; etc. New relations, different meta-narratives, completely unintended by the author, could be revealed (or actually created?) by any of these countless reading paths.

Among innumerable fancifully fictitious chapters, “This. 5” stood out as both true and amusing. Or possibly true but not amusing. Of course it may actually be untrue, but amusing nevertheless. Though perhaps, when all is said and done, and the barn door can no longer be closed, one would have to admit the real likelihood that it is neither true nor amusing.

And in regards to the reviewer-so-called ‘plotlines’, a reviewer (this one) found the Writer Portraits easily the most consistently clever, amusing, and quasi-realistic (though still recognizably PPM). Perhaps a future effort by Mr. Nicholls will give us more of the wry wit, the revelatory ribaldry, and in general the enigmatic and enervating entropy displayed in these chapters. (Perhaps a collection of short fiction built on such a foundation awaits? I for one would quickly lay down my £s.)

Anywise, an easy and rejuvenating read. Never did I have trouble picking up the book for a postmodern perambulation across a fifty-page fragment of Mr. Nicholl’s fertile fields. Nor, for that matter, did I have trouble putting it down, having reached a convenient break in the tale, with a postmodern belch. Quite like the approach often taken with saltilicious snacks – one realizes after several handfuls that enough is enough – then a pint later suddenly sees another handful rapidly approaching the pie-hole.

A word of warning, from this younger-than-you reviewer. If you are more than a generation or two beyond my own youthy age, I’m afraid the post-post-modern style of this book would likely leave you disappointed at best, brain-fried at worst – and that being the likely result of your attempting to negotiate this dystopic weave-world, it would certainly be much safer to stick with authors you feel more comfortable with – Dan Brown, EL James, Ann Coulter, Ayn Rand for example – or, for the more high-brow, JK Rowling or Steven King. Or just stick to baseball books.

Or, to err on the ultra-cautious side, forget about books and turn on the telly.



Oh … and by the way, Mr. Nicholls. I notice on the Corridor of Cheap Commodities a little item that seems like quite a bargain - to wit, “A strange echo is heard in the hilltops. Upon closer investigation it turns out to be nothing.”, for only £0.40. I do believe I could do something with that one, or at least resell it to Lydia D at a modest profit. How might I procure it? I do hope Lydia didn’t snarf it up already.



Bio: The author of this review has been recognized (‘liked’) by more than one reader for his (or is it her?) TMI-ish writings, which have appeared on a certain ‘bookish’ social site entirely unaskedfor. In his (her?) sparetime, the author loves changing batteries in mice and flashlights, and taking her (oops! meant to say “his (her?)” there, tee-hee (oops! meant to say ha-ha)) so-loved pet turtles for long walks back and forth and back and – opps! oh my goodness - er, across busy roadways.


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Previous review: Six Degrees another dystopia
Next review: The Brothers K K as in STEEERRIIIICKTHHRUUUU
Earlier review: When Titans Clashed WW II's Eastern Front

Previous library review: Ghosts of Belfast Stuart Neville
Next library review: The Blind Assassin Marg. Atwood

[Lee Klein · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author photo in the back of the book depicts the human host environment for M.J. Nicholls the author, who looks more like the mid-1500s painting "The Librarian" by Giuseppe Arcimboldo, more like a construction of books. For nearly a decade, I've known the author as a young Scottish reader of Dalkey Archive titles, primarily, who posts perfectly phrased, amusing reviews on a popular book-reviewing site. His novel is a loyal representation of the spirit of this omni-admired/"liked" online manifestation. Perfectly sculpted sentences, awareness of every reaction a reader might make to the author's every action, and a general willingness to err on the side of exaggerated good spirit, to coax way more amusement than tears, and to eschew the conventional formula of fiction (conflict, rising drama, poignancy) in favor of carrying on in a canonical manner from Tristram Shandy and Quixote on down to Borges and Christine Brooke-Rose's Textermination and the like. Like Perec's Life A User's Manual more than House of Leaves, M.J. Nicholls concocts a funhouse for readers wiling and able to live in an Escherian library stocked with mirror-bound books. But the parts this reader loved best were the first thirds of the sections titled "This," those bits where there's a sense of a melancholy human slouched in bed with laptop, addicted to the internet, needing to fill blank pages with text in the tradition of all those books that make the silent solitary reading life seem meaningful.

[Tony Vacation · Rating 5 out of 5]

Who knew an anti-novel could be so propulsive? Or have such a handsome cover design!

The House of Writers removes the starved reader from the bland buffet-line that is the contemporary dystopian novel—vehicles that exist primarily for teens to explore their hormones while wearing skintight leggings and sticking it to mom and dad, i.e., the scary adult world—and happily plops her back into the realm of unnerving parables about the smooshing of the human spirit. A country made brain-dead by the false comforts of technology? A society peopled with boors who demonize the dwindling few who strive to create and/or appreciate works of art that challenge and engage a person's heart, brain and soul? If you bristle or scoff at the plausibility of that scenario then please put down your smart phone, pause the never-ending Netflix stream and consult a mirror beneath some sobering lighting.

Economic disaster has turned Scotland into a hellish nation-sized call-center, a pseudo government which maintains control by humoring every idiotic question, opinion and prejudice of a populace that constantly calls-in seeking personal validation for all of their idiotic questions, opinions and prejudices. This is clearly not an ideal environment for that rare, thoughtful creature known as the author. So stands The House of Writers, a shoddy towerblock which shelters the few writers remaining in Scotland, and wherein they are farmed out to different floors, each level dedicated to a particular genre, and each genre catered to the tastes of the few wealthy individuals who fund the HoW.

But all of this scene setting really doesn't do justice to the actual experience of this novel. The pleasure of The House of Writers is not to be found in its plot (though the book is rife with bite-sized narratives), but in the brio of its confident writing, the black hilarity of its unhinged imagination, the sincerity of its love for books and those sickly few who still love writing and reading them. With a large cast of cartoonish outcasts failing to keep their shit together by pumping out hack works that mostly no one will ever read, THoW burns through one scathing satirical concept after another, sparing no kind of writer or reader along the way as it rollicks toward the inevitability of dystopian despair; but in the wake of all its imaginings—a star-studded literary convention ending in mass suicide, primates with better tastes in art than humans, the eating and breeding of electric sheep, the takeover of a village with a bazooka fashioned out of toasters, bestsellers boasting pages laced with heroin, an assortment of strange lists, even a few ads from sponsors—the game reader is left with a unique reading experience that is as invigorating as it is affecting. It’s not necessary for what is written about to pass as humane—writing is humane. Get me?

[Vit Babenco · Rating 5 out of 5]

If Bible is the book of books then The House of Writers is the pun of puns… The House of Writers is an ultimate postmodern opus because it boasts a record number of allusions per page of text…
The House of Writers is a dystopia designed exclusively for writers…

To clamp down on hate crime, the Tories introduced Artists’ Licenses, whereby every work was made to conform to two rigid dicta: 1) Make it wholly understandable to even the dumbest, most bumbling alien. 2) Make it funny and light and utterly unthreatening to even the most delicate flowers.

But my inner voice tells me that these two rules of creative writing are already being secretly applied to the entire corpus of contemporary literature.
And in The House of Writers dwell all those deviant authors who endeavour to serve the perverted tastes of all those reading freaks and weirdoes who are too corrupt to read the normal books.
There even is a tiny clique producing this special highbrow stuff, which is so dear to the minds of my kind of twisted readers:

To my unquenchable and unfeasible horror, I stood outside myself watching myself, as if my body had floated into a separate consciousness outside my own, hovering outside me like some demon, my pencil describing a 45° arc as it tore itself from my hands, revolving in horripilating loops like the rings of Hell in Dante’s Inferno, searing my heart with fire and hurt, pulling me down to the depths of despair as in Mirbeau’s Torture Garden, as my treasured and beautiful pencil, the passion of my heart and my very life’s blood, my one and only love, came crashing to the floor like an orchestra in the fires of Abaddon, swallowed up by the interminable, tormenting flames of the remorseless carpet.

Life of all those authors however isn’t milk and honey for every one of them manages to have a single reader at best.
But any true writer will never stop writing even if there are no readers at all.

[Geoff · Rating 5 out of 5]

For those of us lamenting, for those of us proceeding, for those of us busy being born while busy dying, for those of us deadbeat debtors, for those of us concealing, for those of us slacking, for those of us lacking, for those of us bad-skinned bad-teethed bad-timed bad-tempered, for the needle-and-threaders, for the scanners of the sky, for the makers of beautiful things in a world of total indifference, for linguistic lovers lapping language lasciviously lunchhours-long, for the dead-tired benchers, for the jilts in quilts, for the bed-head, for the snowbound jerks, for the knee-knocked acne queen, for Tilly, Milly, and Jane, for the choiceless voiceless child in the box elder shadow, for the mirrored kids we can never be again, for Four-Minute Maddie, for Justin & Arthur stoned in the woods near the church, for the eight-tracker, the broken-stringer, for those of us in line to buy a toaster, for those who have wished to say and really mean it “one more time with feeling”, for good readers, for Goodreaders, the dying breeds, the lost colonies, the scattered patriots, the anti-flag bearers, the defenders of dustbin causes and nostalgia perimeters, for Johnny Dollar & Matt Dylan, may they rest where radio waves meet the beyond, for George Lewis, the Englishman, the Italian and the Jew, for the retreating sine waves, for the beach-skinned beauties always in the distance, for mountains of beaches, for Sebald’s sea of pines and the gathering mist of early deaths, for the dethroned archivist of happier days, for the tilt into the wind, for the longest bath, for the warriors of the skatepark, for Tim, the dim light at the end of the passage, for those of us cackling time down to dust, for breathers through the walls of eternal asbestos, for hammer-and-nailers, for lathers, for those of us who want to know what forgetting the dream inverses when we wake, for grave-fondlers, for word-smithers, for makers of masks, for the river-straddlers and the dung beetle march, for leaves moving slightly in the third breeze of autumn, for no-voters, for moon-blighters, for Pharaoh, the last horse on the strand, for scribblers and scribes ascending the final escalator to ice-cream heaven, for the vacant lot lizard, for good old neon, for the ten-dollar beer, for Ben in the basement, where machines are set to boil, for those of us whipped by a cold wind at a waterfall, for the cloud-hours, for the beet-stained fingertips, for the feet in the fountain, for light on water, for writers of letters and wax-sealers, for the accumulated scum, for the low boom, for the already-lost when the lightbulb blew, for the weird polyphony at the edge of the solar system, for fuck’s sake, for Christ’s blood, for Increase Mather, for the price of salt, for Medusa’s diary, for keepers of mementos from before the flood, for those of us who wish to sidestep it all, for do-overs and discolored polaroids, for real this time, for sure, for those of us on this and that side of the oceans, “for once with feeling”, for the baby-tongued, for sisters dancing, for a jalopy by the reservoir, for submerged bubblers in inky depths, for the projector operators, lies behind the light, layers of bricks of tricks, master manipulators of meaning in the moaning morning, where fog raises and divides, for the buffalo obscured, for that time, for eraser shavings on the calendar, for Big Bill Broonzy and the lemonade stand that couldn’t, for the heavenly road of snail-slime we once remembered, for the garden the gate and the path, for a tree of bones that told us, for a slice of carpet that kept us, for a cold side of stone we bent on, for the irretrievable kite, for the above the fields, for the rockets red glare, for the years go splat, for the wishers on the quay that never was, for a ghost-kiss from Denise, that swimming thing, we forgot to drink the cure but the raspberries were fine, for the we shouldn’t have, for the we tried, for the hope for something else, for the never-sorted fakebook, for those of us with dreams still heavy in our hair, for ear-bleeding chaos in the parking lot and the kids who disappeared : The House of Writers. Thank god for souls like MJ Nicholls, out there fighting the good fight in a fallen world. ~~It was in the reign of Trump the first that the above-named personages lived and quarrelled ; good or bad, handsome or ugly, rich or poor, they are all equal now.~~

[Zadignose]

The House of Writers is a unique, original work, with familiar elements but also presenting its own personality. It has an absurd manner, it is self-aware and self-effacing--at the same time it communicates an impression / anxiety about a very bleak state of affairs in the arts (particularly the literary arts) and the prospects of anyone who wants to retain a soul within our soul-obliterating society. It also deals--by nature somewhat solipsistically--with the writers' dilemma: attempting to innovate and express in the face of the (perceived) impossibility of innovation and the futility of expression--crushed under the weight of the already accomplished masters; confronted by an audience of the jaded, the absent, the slobbering idiot; lost in the flood of output from the drone literature producers who have already surrendered, assuming they had anything to surrender to begin with.

Society with art is hopeless, society without art is unthinkable.

Because this is a comedy, I at first worried a little bit that it might not be tough enough, i.e., it might not unleash enough sincere anger or confront the bleakness of its topic if the expression remained mostly couched in jokes. The book tips its hat many, many times--in fact the book is hatless--to Gilbert Sorrentino (among others), and with good reason. It has formal similarity to Sorrentino, especially in the presentation of lists. But Sorrentino is a nasty motherfucker. Nicholls is perhaps a little more light-hearted, despite writing a dystopian alternative/hyperbolic reality to our own. But I would say, by the end, the balance came out just right, and the correct degree of bitterness and bleakness was allowed to come through.

By the way, in my first read, the part which struck me as best was the middle-section, "Things to do before writing the next paragraph," an enormous concatenation of absurdities that had me laughing all the way.

I'd say this is a leap forward for the author of Postmodern Belch, and it's all-around well accomplished. I liked the length, the pace, the development, the resolution.

Ah, but poor writers. We're all doomed.

[David Katzman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Disclaimer: I was asked to read this book pre-publication by the author and publisher to provide a promotional quote. I stand by my comments; I loved this book. Here's what I said:

I could be wrong, but I believe this novel was transmitted into the author's mind by the illegitimate love child of Bill Hicks and David Foster Wallace. Like a proverbial middle finger to the middlebrow, M.J. Nicholls has given himself the Herculean task of making fiction matter. Usurped by hacks and the hyperactivity of hyperlinks, meaningful stories have become exceedingly rare. Or, even worse, are rarely read because who got time for dat? Enter this rare novel that wages war on corporate mediocrity in a fantastical future where books are reduced to ego strokes commissioned by rich fucks. Fiction to match your sofa. Fortunately, Nicholls shreds the commoditization of our existence like a literary Tasmanian devil with razor sharp wit. Fierce​, original and delirious, The House of Writers is a comedic masterwork that defies convention.

[Ian "Marvin" Graye]

Not an Honest Review by a Friend of the Author of This Book...

The eponymous house of writers suffered from a multi-story writer's block not remedied by its metafictional form. And too but comes in under 350 pages;;; which will disappoint the chiefs, assistant chiefs, molls, henchmen and lackeys from the "is long, is good" knitting circle.

Raine Upright

A Blurb by the Author's Legal Representative

"First, a few words on the novel. This is a book about writers, a whole houseful of them, and the innumerable ways in which they irritate the author: their vanities, their rivalries, their eccentricities, their hideous deformed faces. Effectively, this novel is a concentrated act of violent hatred against all writers, especially ones the author knows."

Full Disclosure

I have read some of the author's previous efforts, and am reluctant to duplicate the experience.

This novel is published by a New Jersey publisher Sagging Meniscus Press which "punches the truth hard", "defends an alternative vision of the twenty-first century, a beautiful one we believe in with our hearts, not the tawdry one that happens to exist and to which we are constantly asked to submit by well-meaning and other blowhards" and perpetuates the belief that the author is, like one of his characters, a "pathetically verbally self-conscious hero who’s an exactitude slave to literary integrity that attempts to pierce the fiction/reality divide to which he’s a writerly insider/outsider tumbled by word-beset rectitude".

Sagging Meniscus Press publishes Jacob Smullyan's books. It proposes to publish Jacob's forthcoming novel, The Sultan of Brisbane, which is concerned with annoying persons.

A Factual Correction

Sagging Meniscus Press is run by Jacob Smullyan from New Jersey. The author is not Jacob Smullyan, nor has he ever worked out of New Jersey.

Another Factual Correction

This book is a “labyrinthine satiric masterpiece . . . destined for a place in the pantheon of eternal pleasures.”

[Nate D · Rating 4 out of 5]

A polyphonic satire on the horrors of literature and publishing, or attempts towards such. With a bit, thrown in, it could be argued, of the joys of reading, of writing, and of stumbling around in a condemned library until you fall through a false wall into a secret cache comprising the entire output of a fringe sub-movement of mid-century Budapest avant-garde poets now remembered only for expunging all parts of speech from their works but indefinite articles and adverbs, having sacrificed all other words to erect barricades against the incoming Russian tanks in '56, a historically failed venture that left the survivors composing with what remained to them from exile on the Isle of Wight until the mid-70s when a harsh winter finished them off.

This also could be taken, having been published in 2016, as a kind of marker of the first decade of the existence of Goodreads which, 100 years from now and following the collapse of the internet into an electromagnetic void, might serve to explain why countless book-inclined humanoids spent so much time scrubbing the wash of post-digital civilization for new leads on essential (often forgotten) things to read. Many of them dwell in these pages, tucked into esoteric prose byways and asides, and moving outside the context-of-creation that gives me some additional working-familiarity with the contents here, likely to provide an occasionally deceptive but generous map for centuries of enterprising biblionauts to come.

In summary: A labyrinthine satiric masterpiece destined for a place in the pantheon of eternal pleasures, a gallimaufry of stop-start narratives, and a crisp and buttery concoction that tantalizes the mind.

(Since this novel contains itself at several points, I choose to imply that it also contains this review by blatantly plagiarizing at two points, and perhaps less blantantly plagiarizing at others I am unaware of due to the work having cannibalized my mental functions in stages over the week or so I spent with it.)

[Nathan "N.R." Gaddis]

"Arno Schmidt's Republica Intelligensia this is not. It is however in the genre of the Artist Colony. So there's that. It's also not as HEAVY as Schmidt's and perhaps not quite as 'better for you in the LONG RUN'. Sort of like a Big Leg Emma to Some Ballet Music." --Annoying Zappa Fan

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Although the blurb suggests a sort of post-apocalyptic dystopia, ‘The House of Writers’ is really more of a sprawling literary parody. It is ostensibly set in Scotland, after the whole country has become a call centre (‘ScotCall’) and the few writers still in existence have moved into a decrepit tower block/sweatshop for fiction. Each floor has a different specialism: romance, experimental, sci-fi, etc. As befits any literary parody, the narrative is aggressively non-linear. It switches constantly between a tour of the tower block floors, interjections from the supposed author, several different character viewpoints, a flashback to the formal end of fiction writing, adverts for ScotCall, etc. Nicholls mocks a number of literary devices while indulging in them, particularly lists. There are many lists in ‘The House of Writers’, of varying tolerability. As a parody, it is scattershot and messy, but intermittently very funny.

The tone reminded me of Only Americans Burn in Hell: an author using defensive nihilism and self-deprecation to simultaneously mock their peers and preempt critical review. Or perhaps I’m being uncharitable. In any case, I mostly enjoyed ‘The House of Writers’ as a parody of contemporary literature and publishing, albeit rather belaboured in parts, but don’t think it works as a dystopia. Also, it probably didn’t need to be quite so long. The funniest parts were generally one-liners, puns, or single-chapter gags. ‘The Jesus Memos’ was particularly amusing. This also made me smile (although it might not amuse without context):

ScotCall enacted various tactics to clear their buildings and roads. Helicopters went skywards so operatives could scatter the ten most common solutions written on millions of strips of paper onto the customers heads. The top ten queries were: 1) How do I turn toast back into bread? 2) Is Monaco a country? 3) Can I use 1½ AA batteries instead of an AAA? 4) What shape is a square? 5) Who is Tim Pritchards? 6) Is it legal to sing a pop song in public without seeking public performing permissions? 7) Does a radioactive duck have green poo? 8) How many numbers are there in the alphabet? 9) Where is the toilet? 10) Can I put a fridge on my cat when she’s asleep?

Finally, I must address the author’s curious claim that shortbread contains yeast. This is mentioned several times, leading me to believe that it’s a deliberate mistake for comic effect. Either that or Nicholls has not only has never made shortbread, but never eaten it either. It’s a solid biscuit, not an actual bread that rises! Although I’m a dreadful cook, I can still make shortbread because it has only three ingredients: butter, sugar, and flour. (If you’re feeling fancy, you can put in some cinnamon.) I found this pedantic detail really quite distracting, for some reason. Possibly because the idea of shortbread with yeast in it is so repulsive. In any case, I think ‘The House of Writers’ gets a bit too self-indulgent to be a truly incisive parody. To an extent parody is in the eye of the beholder, though, and it is fun to read.

[Simon Robs · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm top-spinning trying to gain a beachhead from which to launch "some" kind of précis of this blithering display of imaginative [meta]-meta story telling. A "bookish" dystopian slog of a novel about a novel and the state of the world et literary world which is in disrepair to say the least. That, the "real" author Mr. Nichols has an axe to grind fuming as he does against the withering state of spate dumbed-down literature may be the take away including his own work to the extent that it's a swollen tongue that's protruding his blushed cheek when, as one character late in the novel describes THoW as:

"the hottest thing in the literary world since Nora Barnacle's knickers,"

"This novel is a crisp, buttery concoction that tantalizes the mind ... a soft and mouthwatering crunch of pleasure tingling on the cortices and yumming up the imagination."

"A ho-hum gallimaufry of stop-start narratives, banal tangents, and boorish satirical pokes," "a towering inferno of misrepresentation," and "the nadir of attempted comedy."

The novel [THoW] is broken apart (like its world of 2050) into differing viewpoints and sections that repeat giving some continuity to its narrative structure whilst splaying words, ideas, anecdotes, sample book titles, historical backdrops, etc., etc., like a mad impressionistic painter spewing colors dervish-style at a holographic canvas of the mind. It's a future not so far away with many touchstones of our own so that it's chilling in recognition. I'm reminded of Gilliam's "Brazil" (film) where we also see recognizable features of modern day life mixed with futuristic flourishes and phantasmagorical splicing, disrupting our fix on the drama as it unfolds.

Nichols sites several current/past authors throughout this book in both positive and less-so context presumably his own nods to writers and craft. Ultimately, this book I believe a paean to "quality lit" in our own sea of increasing mediocrity, our age of info-blown everything for anybody with an Internet connection. It's a clarion call, the tweety in the coal mine is coughing up feathers of its own molt, our book future is uncertain like our environment is telling us it's getting hot in here.

There's just too much in THoW to do justice in my style of "quasi-review" - many others have also proffered their framed takes which when patched together should give heady adumbration to this panoramic "house of comedic brouhaha" (twice mentioned in book GOODREADS!). This book is a zinger; read it!

[David Lentz · Rating 5 out of 5]

How shall I say this? You may consider it hyperbole. The flattery of a fool unschooled in either High Quality Literary Fiction (HQLF) or, even worse, a soul lacking a sense of humor. You may say, Lentz, go back and hide on the First Floor of THOW with the other poor devils possessed by the obsession -- I say it boldly and without reserve or shame -- to write HQLF. By what other name shall I call it than obsession? Clearly, there's no money in HQLF. It would be laughable to imagine anything resembling fame emanating from the paltry exercise of egoism, which is HQLF. Where did "The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman" get Laurence Sterne? Or what became of JP Donleavy after "The Ginger Man" came to see the light of day? How the groundlings spurned "A Modest Proposal" by Jonathan Swift. I do truly weep to imagine David Foster Wallace at the end of his rope. Don't get me started on what the comedies of Oscar Wilde did for him. His gaolers must have laughed their heads off throughout the incarceration of that gifted writer of HQLF. Immortality, you may ask? Please, do grow up. So it begs the question: why does anyone in their right mind write HQLF? No one really has the time to read it. No one is prepared to invest the most paltry sum for an e-book of even the most brilliant work of HQLF. Fortunately, in the future for those addicted to the unholy oppression of writing HQLF there is "The House of Writers." And Nicholls may not be in his right mind. How could any writers of HQLF possibly be of sound mind? At least, if the prophecy of the scriptures are fulfilled, then the writers of HQLF will have somewhere safe and warm to take them in (prepositional ending). Somewhere to commiserate with others of their petty and miserable ilk. It sounds like Paradise to me. How I yearn for it. Grant me the steaming porridge, the zesty and savory intellectual comfort food of The House of Writers any day. What an upgrade it would be to anyone writing HQLF in this age. Ah, but this isn't about me, is it? It is about serious literature. And its place in the civilization of humanity well after we've been put out to pasture. Will humanity in 2050 miss HQLF? Don't make me laugh. The genre will be long since gone. And its writers will be exposed for the egoists they most surely were. In 2100 will the intelligentsia long for the Golden Age of HQLF among the overgrown ruins of The House of Writers? Surely, we are blessed to have the prophetic vision of Nicholls to imagine it. For is he not the Jeremiah, Isaiah, Ezekiel and Zechariah of all writers of HQLF wandering aimlessly among the heatherclad heaths and heathcliffs of the highlands of ScotCall? But let me circle back to my first point, if I may. I hope to, by now, have convinced you that, normally, I am not a purveyor of praise: far from it. I am, after all, a CRITIC. (If you don't believe me, ask my wife.) I take the title of Goodreads Critic with desperate solemnity. So I will risk that I may throw-up a little in my mouth when I report this to you. This critical qualitative description of sangfroid, when misapplied, is a malapropos utterly sickening to give or take. It offends the intellectual ear with its saccharine ring. I use it only sparingly and as a last resort. And like profanity in my HQLF I eschew it out of hand. However, well, here it is. Ahem. I find that one pervasive literary quality resides in the comic wit of the HQLF of MJ Nicholls. I found this quality first in my reading of "Post-Modern Belch," which I could not put down as I laughed my head off throughout (double prepositional ending). Furthermore, this most elusive literary quality resides in "The House of Writers." And that quality is: G...Sorry. Gee...Harrumph...Pardon me. Genie...Forgive this brief respite and bathroom break: this word does give me pause. And triggers grand disquiet in us all. Let's try, again...The word is...Genius... There now, that wasn't so hard. I'm feeling better now, having belched that out. The wit that resides in "The House of Writers" is comic Genius. This book is world-class. It is one for the ages. So if you give even a brass farthing for the state of the quality of serious literature to be read by your children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, then take a lesson from "The House of Writers" and support HQLF wherever you may find it, like here. Then go out to your favorite independent bookstore or, if necessary, online and buy this genius, masterpiece, possibly immortal, literary novel.

[Kathleen Nicholls · Rating 5 out of 5]

If i didn't love my brother so much i'd be incredibly jealous of his amazing writing talent. I'm proud of him for many reasons (his impressive head of hair,his beating my score on Sonic the Hedgehog that time, amongst other things) but his latest book The House of Writers is complex, gripping, inventive and hilarious. Please please read it immediately if you like great books/laughing a LOT/have a pulse xo

[The Bibliofool · Rating 5 out of 5]

Two things tend to happen with me when I read a great book: first, I don't want it to end, second, it makes me want to be a writer. As for M.J. Nicholls' wildly imaginative and biting, nay, jawbreaking satire The House of Writers, I'll just say I didn't want it to end and leave it at that. As alluring as the possibility is of being a "starred"author or Oprah's next book club pick or the creator of a blockbuster office bondage series with an initialed nom de plume, authors clearly do not have an easy go of it. In the dystopian Scotland of Nicholls' future, writers are practically obsolete, save for the lucky(?) few who reside in an Escher-like puzzle of a building called the House of Writers who toil away on the high rise's genre-specific floors (and I mean high rise in the most Ballard of ways), creating custom novels funded by the few voracious—and extremely picky—readers who still exist. It's either that or work for Scotland's call center. That's the simplest way to explain the novel's premise, but there's really nothing simple about this book or its premise. Every chapter is as dense with ideas as any book I've read this year, and every page brought something unexpected, something outlandish, something hilarious—the suicide pact of famous authors in the future at a publishing party is reason enough alone to pick this book up. Yes, I didn't want it to end, and in a way it still made me want to be a writer, but I'm not; I'm a reader and Nicholls' masterful, ingenious, pitch black shotgun blast through the eyes of the publishing industrial complex is so excellent and so bizarre and so original that my words fail to do it justice. The House of Writers is the ultimate bite on the hand that feeds it and Nicholls is too good, I suspect, to ever have to worry about being stationed in the future in the house he envisions.

[S̶e̶a̶n̶]

This book is beyond such nonsense as star ratings. In this post-post-everything literary environment what other novel than this could emerge from the mind of MJ Nicholls, who has with singular focus and aplomb trudged through the pages of virtually every so-called 'experimental' novel logged in the Goodreads database (and to the great benefit of those who read his feed!). After gorging on those yellowed, moth-eaten pages, this stalwart disciple of the Church of Dalkey clearly had no choice but to flex his comedic chops and write a response. And this is it. The seeming cynicism within its pages belies the hope for Literature's Future inherent in the mere fact that he bothered to write and publish anything, let alone a 300-page novel overflowing with clever wordplay. (Unless I confused hope with hubris, which is entirely possible.) But, no, I don't think someone who has given up altogether on literature could write a book such as this one (or any book, for that matter). I don't have much else to say about it other than that you should read it and see for yourself what happens when all of Scotland is transformed into a massive call center and the remaining writers retreat to a labyrinthine high-rise where they eke out a meager existence writing for hire. And for a hint at the fun of ScotCall reps coping with the most absurd queries from the populace, watch these videos.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

This copy was kindly provided by author, GR friend and incurable humorist, M.J. Nicholls (as in "Don't take any wooden nicholls"). Review to follow if I feel up to it.

This post-apocalyptic, post-technogeddon narrative is set in a location which was once recognizably Scotland but which now has become a giant call-centre named (predictably?) ScotCall. But these things, odd as they are, form but the background to this satirical tapestry of comments on the world of authors and the things they produce.

The House of Writers is a sort of refuge-cum-torture chamber to those who are for the most part (not unlike the poets in Plato's time) personae non gratae in the republic. Every aspect of writing is gleefully dissected: beginning inspiration; composition of works; attempts at originality; enslavement to various genres and styles; marketing and promotion; blurb-writing; beta-reading; reviews both positive and negative; delusions of grandeur; authorial eccentricities (cf. particularly the portraits of Rankin and Picoult); post-traumatic writing disorder.

This novel, like A Postmodern Belch before it, is a challenging read, requiring some stamina on the part of the reader, who must do some work to keep bewilderment at bay. There are multiple narrators and plot strands to keep track of. However, one can sense Mr. Nicholls chuckling maniacally to himself as he manipulates the different threads with ease.

[Yolande · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is masterfully written. I loved every bit of it. I started reading this novel in 2021 so it took me a few years to finish since I was too immersed in linguistic research to read any fiction except this. The only author I've read who can make long, seemingly endless lists funny and entertaining - how do you do it MJ?

On to the next novel by MJ, to be read sporadically over an indeterminate time period (hopefully not as many years as I took with this one), as my reading of fiction goes these days.

[Joshua Loong · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the funniest novels I’ve ever read, The House of Writers is a satirical, meta-fictional, linguistic pyrotechnics show about writing novels in a post-literate world. No genre of literature is safe: from the classics to romance, from sci-fi to the literary experimentalists, from middle-brow fiction to memoirs. Nicholls pokes fun at every writer under the sun. Though some might tire of its general plotlessness, the meta-fictional gags, and the endless quips that might find your favourite writer its target, The House of Writers was an absolute joy to read because of how much it revels in a love of all literature. It’s truly a shame how this hasn’t found a larger audience. I’m really glad I was able to pick this up via Kindle Unlimted.

[Andy Dremeaux · Rating 1 out of 5]

I know why I'm here. I'm not lost. Like most of you, I discovered M.J. Nichols from his book reviews. They are sharp, insightful, funny, and appropriately skeptical. He effortlessly takes down critics of his criticism. When I saw he'd written some books, they seemed worth a go. I laughed out loud at the book jacket on Amazon, and placed an order. I'm sure he'll have a go at my review here, too. Fire away, M.J.

M.J. has a lot to say, perhaps too much so. Presented seemingly without an editor or even an editing pass, The House of Writers is a word salad, a slop of free associations and off-the-cuff "jokes" ("flash-in-the-pan" becomes "flash-in-the-bedpan," because... why not?), and a startling lack of focus. I have no idea what I am even reading, here. Nichols thinks himself an ADHD Joyce, perhaps, writing each chapter in a painful style reflective of the word-factory slop the plot of his book is drawing out.

M.J. needs to step back, take a deep breath, and edit: edit his thoughts, edit his concepts, edit his words, edit his book.

Disclosure: I only managed to read 30 pages of this book.

[Olivia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Okay so moment of sincere honesty: I went into this book a little bit of a hater. I got it out the library after the reading the blurb thinking "Either this is going to be an early contender for my favourite book of the year, or it's going to be insufferably smug and self-referential." But, you know what, we have a pretty strong early contender for a top book of 2025!

The House of Writers has the kind of humour written by someone who has watched a hell of a lot of Monty Python and The Day Today. It's satire made by someone who has spent far too long dealing with publishing houses, other writers, and the blank space where their book should be. It's not always as clever or funny as it thinks it is, but it's mostly so, so we'll let it off.

More than anything, I want someone else to read because I want someone else to talk about it with, to the extent that I've made the briefest of forays back onto Goodreads to say so

I am the author of this novel and I have lied to you, and taken unhealthy pleasure in lying to you, and I will continue to lie to you until you beg for more.

[Daniel Cunningham · Rating 4 out of 5]

A hilarious story of editing a literary magazine, as far as I can tell. A "post-modern" send-up of "post-modern" literature, social commentary, run through with murderous household appliances, etc. I.e., near perfect.

[Black Glove · Rating 5 out of 5]

A jokey extravaganza of book-bending shenanigans. The episodic structure of the many-perspectives keeps the wick alight. Sardonic, mischievous, absurdist, insightful. Reminded me of what I truly like about literature, about fiction, about books.

[Doo Rag]

this is pretty great. except for the parts that are merely irritating. or boring.
well, i suppose these were the effects the author was going for.
i'm on page 224.