One of my things is to know nothing about a book, film etc. so that I
can experience the work without prejudice and have the story revealed
to me as the author intended.
Matrix, I was stunned by the unexpected twists and turns. And of
course the Sixth Sense is so much more enthralling if you don’t
know… well, you know. Reading Flann O’Brien’s The Third Policeman fits into the stunner
category. SPOILER ALERT. it begins as a regular, rural murder thriller
but soon turns into a trippy, bizarre, wonderful fantasy that is by
turns Paul Auster, Charles Dickens and Lewis Carroll. Reading the publisher’s notes at the end, I’m reminded that the book
appears fleetingly in the TV series Lost. Now there’s a perfect fit.