A Life Lived in Books

Livio de Marcho is an Italian who likes carving wood. The Venice-native is also a bibliophile, as evidenced by the three houses he’s carved that have a “books” motif.

De Marcho’s wooden books exist in a generic form; that is, there are no titles or authors on the spines or words on the pages (that I can make out, anyway). But if you commissioned one of these houses, it would have been fun to invent titles, excerpts and blurbs for these tomes.

And if you didn't have any ideas, the folks over at OrbitBooks.net would be happy to help. They just held a contest to pick a book title for their “most awesomely bad title-for an imaginary science fiction/fantasy novel”. The winner?

Across a Trembling Sea the Cyborg Fairies Dance

Reader comments on this book were also worthy. They included imaginary author endorsements (“Among the first books I received this week.” –Ursula K. LeGuin) and jacket copy (“She’s their only hope — and she doesn’t even know they exist”).

Ooh, here's another couple:

She thought the tumultuous ocean of her passion would be enough to win over the handsome fae stranger that haunted her dreams. But then she found out that he had a heart of steel — literally.

“This is a book. Things happen in it.” –Patrick Rothfuss