As a kid, when i heard that caption'THE BEAUTIFUL ONES ARE NOT YET BORN', it made me feel very ugly
i started reading quite early, at about 8,' thing fall apart' made a lot of sense to me
but as a kid, whenever i tried 'the beautiful ones are not yet born',
it never made any sense at all to me
because while reading, i just wanted to find out Kwei's reasons for calling all of us 'ugly'
anyway, later as an adult, i read the book, and then it made a lot of sense.
another book that used to decieve me then was all of 'James Chase'
Naked beautiful women on the cover and nothing about them inside
as a kid, that really pissed me too.
so i'm just curious
what are some of the books that got you really wondering from the captions, or back pages
that got you making up the story in your head even before you read it
then after you read it, you found out it said something totally different

the palm wine drinkard
the title earned me a very interesting discussion with all the literature teachers in my school and my mom
i read the book and bagged another discussion
only after reading it for the second time with prior knowledge of what it was i was reading, did it finally make sense to me
there's sense in absolute rubbish is what i learnt

the beautiful ones are not yet born was d most confusing book i read when i was a kid. didn't get past the second chapter though. i just had to stop after a graphic description of a man sitting in a bus and having siliva ooze from his mouth while he dozed peacefully (if i remeber correctly). i might pick it up again too see if i can make sense of it now if i come across it again.

One book which also intrigued me as a young man is "A Dance of the Forest" by Wole Soyinka. I read it thrice before I could get the message our which my Prof was trying to pass across.

D novel that almost got me confused was THE MERCHANT OF VENICE .by william shakespear.becos he always write his books on old english.if emphasis are not made u may nt b able to understand.bt nw it's one of the intrestin novel eva read by me.

glad to know i am notthe only one.
there is this book i have. i have been trying to read it for over two years now but all efforts are proving abortive. i need someone to tell me that reading that book is possible. who has read 'the man died' prison notes of Wole Soyinka

Fame fatal - I'v been trying 2 read this book 4 over 3 yrs now nd all i know abt d book is its abt a writer nd his editor. Still doesn't make sense 2 me.

can't believe it took me a year to get through the first chapter. the man died, is an interesting book. chapter eight now. Before i read it, i kept saying to myself that no book can be so boring as to kill me, then it turned out the book wasn't even boring afterll.

so say that to yourself, whenever you want to attack your fame fatal again

i give it a try, 10x 4 d tip

dance of a forest is quite interesting

Dance in the forest. Is that by Wole Soyinka

For me, that will be The Trial by Franz Kafka.
Funny and full of unresolved and intriguing suspense! At the end, you wonder if its a novel or just someone trying to recollect so many dreams of Josef K the central character. It was after reading commentaries on it that the full message dawned.

The other one is Lives Of The Poets by E.L Doctorow.
Initially I thought it will offer a glimpse into the lives of some famous poets. Turns out to be a successful mix of creativity, imagination and logic woven into each other. Glad I read it through!

my reply will be a bit different and off the point. the books i want to comment on are the ones that gave me no room to start guessing, and by that i'm talking of Chimamanda's two books: purple hibiscus and half of a yellow sun. those two books really brought my knees down because i always try to guess what's inside a book before i start reading. on those two books, i failed.

Thomas hardy's 'Tess of the d'urbervilles' is one confusing book dat really gave me problems. Even after my teacher had given me a detailed summary, there were still some grey areas. For instance, after tess had killed alec, she was hanged ( according to d summary); but i could not find where it was written in d book