XX by Rian Hughes is $5 on
Amazon.com
The author is a graphic designer, and the book has a really unique presentation (similar to House of Leaves), like
this example where the text is formatted to show a door in negative space. I don't know how well it's adapted in ebook form. The Kindle sample has a lot of images and computer screenshots, so they're certainly trying.
More images here:
Rian Hughes uses type and layout as part of the narrative in XX: A Novel, Graphic
I think I'll avoid the ebook edition.
Quote:
The battle for your mind has already begun.
At Jodrell Bank Observatory in England, a radio telescope has detected a mysterious signal of extraterrestrial origin—a message that may be the first communication from an interstellar civilization. Has Humanity made first contact? Is the signal itself a form of alien life? Could it be a threat? If so, how will the people of Earth respond?
Jack Fenwick, artificial intelligence expert, believes that he and his associates at tech start-up Intelligencia can interpret the message and find a way to step into the realm the signal encodes. What they find is a complex alien network beyond anything mankind has imagined.
Drawing on Dada, punk, and the modernist movements of the 20th century, XX is assembled from redacted NASA reports, artwork, magazine articles, secret transcripts, and a novel within a novel. Deconstructing layout and language in order to explore how ideas propagate, acclaimed designer and artist Rian Hughes's debut novel presents a compelling vision of humanity's unique place in the universe, and a realistic depiction of what might happen in the wake of the biggest scientific discovery in human history.
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