Summarise a Novel in 25 Words

On the Road - Kerouac

In a car with a redneck with ADHD, smoke reefer, go to mexico, find sluts, go home.

Junky - William S. Borroughs

Herion is good, no wait, it's bad. Wait. It's good, or maybe it's a lifestyle choice. No wait, young boys are better.

Howards End

Boy, Victorian and Edwardian society is strict. A Cottage and cradle robbing are thrown into the mix, and rich mingle with the poor a little.

Exodus, Leon Uris

Holocaust, nurse, ship, Palestine, Jews, Arabs suck, British suck. Hero gets girl.

The Haj, Leon Uris

Arabs suck, Muslims suck, and suck and suck and suck. Hero goes nuts.

Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas

Gambling, sex, and Johnny Depp are cool. But drugs are better.

Revolutionary Road

"Honey, wouldn't life be easier if you were more intelligent, if I actually wanted kids, if we had a modicum of courage and if Ike wasn't ruling the country?"

The entire Tom Wolfe catalogue

"I am clearly smarter than you. Eat my dust."

B. Traven - The Treasure of the Sierra Madre

Three guys seek Mexican gold. Hardship, privation and bandits. There is much mutual suspicion. In the end greed brings about robbery and betrayal. Protagonist dies.

J. D. Salinger - Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters

Seymour skips own wedding. Disgruntled family of bride wind up at best man's apartment. Lots of alcohol served. While they recover, Seymour and bride elope.

I'm the best liar ever. Frederick Barbarossa adopted me. My pals and I found mythological creatures and the Grail. Did you catch all my references?

Verbminx:
>>Musical prodigy receives all sorts of erudite training growing up, becomes leader of civilized world, plays best game ever, retires, imagines other lives, and dies. <<

Hesse, the glass bead game; sometimes also called Magister Ludi.

Infinite Jest - David Foster Wallace

Genius kid passes out on floor; inside joke. Family members (?) are weird. Drugs. Drugs. Drugs. Drugs. Zzzz.

Timelike Infinity - Stephen Baxter

Humanity vs Entropy. Entropy wins, mostly.

The Brothers Karamazov-

Dirty old man is murdered; it's one of his three sons! Hoorah, Aloysha!

Sometimes a Great Notion-

While logging, a man’s younger, college-educated, pot-smoking half-brother sleeps with his wife. It sure rains a lot in Oregon.

The Godfather -

No, Dad, I don't want to join the family business.
Oh no, Dad's dead. Think I'll kill everyone who ever fucked with the family buisness.

Where's the ring? Hide it from Sauron. Wait a few years. OK, now take the ring to Sauron. You heard me. Take some friends too.

Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace

Hal, tennis prodigy, tries to speak; gibberish emerges. And but so what happened? No clue. Something to do with a lethally entertaining movie. And drugs.

Sandman issues 1 to 75 - Neil Gaiman

I have no sense of humor. My ceaseless self-pity causes me to orchestrate my own death. Trick ending available for despairing fans.

the strange case of dr jekyll and mr hyde

Little evil man and portly elite man are one and the same.

Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman

Help girl. Get sucked into mysterious underworld of London. Meet insane angel. Kill it. Earn ability go home. Home sucks, go underground again.

The Count of Monte Cristo, by Alexandre Dumas

Honest young sailor betrayed and abandoned. Finds treasure, becomes rich and powerful. Plots ingenious ways to avenge his misfortune, succeeds. Finds love, contentment and happiness.

Waiting for Godot:

Nothing happens. Twice.

The Wasp Factory

About a guy whose's really a girl and has killed three family members before age of eight. Some comic interludes.

Gravity's Rainbow

Slothrop's erections presages rocket arrivals, Germans love S&M, assorted other subplots.

Mahaabhaarathaa: (although not a novel)

The world, power, wealth, land, women are maayaa. A war for them is idiocy. Only a fool doesn't realise this. The wise do. I do.

Crud, somebody beat me to it. Well here's mine anyway.

Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown
and
Angels and Demons, by Dan Brown
and
probably his other books, if he only uses this same template.

Academic consults on bizarre crime. Meets cutie. Uncovers huge conspiracy. Minor good guy is actually bad guy, and insane. No conspiracy after all. Ending fizzles.

Wheel of Time series, by Robert Jordan

Local boy actually chosen one. Must harness powers (while going schizophrenic) before battle with ultimate evil. All women are grouchy. Only 10 books to go.

Cold Mountain, by Charles Frazier

Man walks five hundred miles for a roll in the hay.

Focault's Pendulum, by Umberto Eco

Crazy man brings weird message to publishers. Publishers invent a conspiracy to explain it, but everything is already a conspiracy. Blame everything on Knight's Templar.

I jacked off with the liver, the rest is whining about my mom.

George Orwell - 1984

2004

Harry Potter books

Orphan finds that life is magical, but not all fun and games. In fact, it’s a downright pain at times. And sometimes quite terrifying.

Ullysses by James Joyce

Leopold Bloom wanders around Dublin, reminisces, frets about Molly's adultery, eats, tries to make a buck, masturbates. Crosses paths with Stephen Dedalus. Molly masturbates. Yes!

The reader is repeatedly made aware that the rhythm will get him/her. Monosyllabic jabberings commence, and then the rhythm actually gets him/her. End.
--- Rhythm Is Gonna Get You by Gloria Estefan

The Razor's Edge

Young man damaged by war, hangs out with coal miners, farmers, prostitutes, yogis. Enlightenment ensues. Ex-girlfriend still pissed.

Of Human Bondage

Self-conscious med student falls for waitress. Everyone knows she's going to use him, which she does. Repeatedly. He ends up happy, despite never going to Spain.

The Fall (Albrt Camus)

I'm Jean-Baptiste. Modern man: fornicates and reads the paper. I did too, now I'm conceited. Did I mention I let a woman drown? My bad.

1984 - George Orwell

Think rebellious thoughts, drink, hide from TV, drink, snog [more dumb than revolutionary] redhead, drink, hate BB, drink, get rats on face, love BB, drink.

The Bible

I am the boss. Do exactly as I say. Don’t think. Be good until I tell you to kill, then act like it didn’t happen.

A Tale of Two Cities - Charles Dickens

I just don't get the doppelganger thing at all ...

1984:
When in totalitarian dystopia--big brother behind every screen--and love starts to make you question state ideology, remember: hold your shoddy commie cigarettes carefully!

:::?
human experiment subject / concentration camp escapee singlehandedly challenges british dystopia; conscientiously objecting intuitive cop takes LSD to track him down; vi veri veniversum vivus vici.

Wonderland, Joyce Carol Oates

Dad SUUUUUCKS! Grandpa sucks. These weird eater people suck. Being a resident sucks. My kid sucks. Thinks I suck. Acid sucks. This ending sucks.

The Witches by Roald Dahl (aka the first book I ever liked reading)

Witches covenent decides to kill all English children with cursed sweets that turn them into mice and kill them in mousetraps. Cursed mouse-boy recalls tale.

mouse-boy is one, hyphenated word. shut up. shut-up.

The IluvBooks 25 words or less synopsis of Ulysses is encapsulated withing the Scylla and Charybdis chapter:

"Life is many days. This will end"

Nobody Walks in LA by John Bwarie

A Native Angeleno drives LA's freeways, experiences the City, recalls his past, finds true love (and himself), and reveals the metropolis's true nature.

Utopia

Thomas More blueskies a creepy, sixteenth-century Singapore, radically re-inventing society. (Later executed for conservative views.)

120 Days of Sodom by Sade

Buggery by numbers

1984 - George Orwell

Winston Smith does his job. Listens to Will Young in the pub.
Then appears on pilot for 'I'm a celebrity' doesn't get out.
Gets very depresssed, can't trust anyone again. Julia was a bitch.

This thread is mentioned in today's Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/webwatch/