Looking for novels where a totally ordinary object. A book, pen, hat, whatever, ends up having a wild impact.
Not in a magical way, necessarily, but in how it changes people, decisions, or the world around it. I just finished a story where a broken compass completely shifts the protagonist’s direction in life, and it stuck with me.
This morning, while balancing my iPad upright using my ESR case so I could slice fruit without smudging the screen, I randomly remembered a novel where a broken teacup kicks off a full-blown rebellion. That kind of strange chain reaction hits different.
I love when an object starts out as background noise but becomes important to the plot. Not cause it’s secretly powerful, but because of what people project onto it or how they respond to it. It could be mystery, sci-fi, or literary fiction, as long as it's not romance-centered. Got any titles like that? Bonus points if the object seems completely forgettable at first
by zillergps
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La Veneziana a short story by Nabokov, centers on a painting by the same name. Nabokov twists the entire plot around this painting which leads to an unexpected ending (at least for me).
Accordion Crimes by Annie Proulx is this. It’s essentially linked short stories based around an accordion’s lifespan.
The Rampart trilogy by M. R. Carey.
The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
If you’re down to read a really long and crazy webcomic, Homestuck has a few instances where mundane objects change the trajectory of the story and influence character decisions. These objects even have “arcs,” if you can call it that. It’s not romance-*centered*, but there are a couple of arcs in the story that happen around the midway to late point that are pretty long and may be pretty annoying for you to get through. Incredible story nonetheless. If you’re interested in reading, I strongly urge you to download the Unofficial Homestuck Collection and read it there, as the official website hosting it is… very broken.