The Perfume, by Patrick Suskind is a book that was thrown into my lap in high-school, which was not on the curriculum, but that I read anyway and was hooked from the very first page.
It's starts you off set ages ago in a dingy French town in the middle of a squalid market, where this woman gives birth amid fish guts and garbage and leaves her baby there to die. What you don't see coming is the exact description of every smell and experience that this boy, who having survived can remember, thanks to a "gift" which is his very keen sense of smell. His name is "Jean Baptiste Grenouille" and he is one of the most repulsive, yet intriguing characters that I have ever read about. I have since then seen the movie and reread the book and find that it's definitely not suitable for everyone, also, this time around I realized that I might have preferred a different ending. The essence of this book is it's main character, he's gritty, repulsive, he is "Grenouille". I recommend this book to anyone who has an open mind, if you're only into classical tales or novels, this book isn't for you.