House Of Holes

These are just four of countless synonyms for “penis” in Nicholson Baker’s scandalous, new, semi-pornographic novel, House of Holes, which will be released on August 9th.

Baker, a highly respected author with a grandfatherly demeanor, is treading into dangerous waters with this one, but it’s territory he’s seen before, having written Vox, a novel on phone sex, and The Fermata, one of the most sexually explicit books ever published. In House of Holes, though, plot and character development take a backseat to pure, unadulterated smut, which critic Sam Anderson calls “an impossible combination of crazy, cheerful imagination and industrial-grade filth.”

The book is made up of a series of vignettes, loosely tied together with a tenuous plot centered on a fantasy theme park (imagine an adult Disneyland on Viagra) where any visitor can fulfill his or her desires -- at a steep price. But, really, each chapter just focuses on a different experience on the sexual spectrum, highlighting the strange, surprising and diverse nature of human sexuality.

The literary value of House of Holes can get muffled in all the salaciousness, but the novel is really a writing exercise. Baker uses sex as a way to flaunt his prodigious vocabulary, and it's these colorful descriptions that elevate the book above pornography (and is probably why Simon & Schuster agreed to publish it). Baker is rethinking erotic fiction to figure out a way to talk about sex in a society where pornography is abundant and ubiquitous.

Whether its subject matter offends or arouses you, House of Holes will be the novel of summer, and people are going to be talking about it for a long time. So you'd best form an opinion now. That's why we secured a sneak peek for you of the shocking, scintillating, controversial tale.