NOT BY THE COVER

Amazon.com has a new feature which it calls 'statistically improbable phrases'. This uses computer technology to scour famous books and find unusual phrases which occur within and rarely in other books. The resulting phrases often give a flavour of the book as a whole:

1 War and Peace ('downy lip' / 'hundred roubles' / 'cried the count')
2 The Secret History ('house chairperson' / 'red moustache')
3 Morvern Callar ('goldish lighter' / 'glittering knee' / 'north pier')
4 Jane Eyre ('poor orphan child' / 'bethought myself')
5 American Psycho ('wool tuxedo' / 'her asshole' / 'drink tickets')
6 1984 ('chocolate ration' / 'girl with dark hair' / 'three farthings')
7 Don Quixote ('intrepid heart' / 'fulling hammers' / 'good squire')
8 Lord of the Flies ('his spear' / 'blow the conch')
9 Oliver Twist ('merry old gentleman' / 'his cocked hat')
10 Cold Comfort Farm ('cletter the dishes' / 'little green parlour')
11 Yellow Dog ('porno people' / 'cur moment')
12 Decline and Fall ('indecent behaviour' / ' capital fellow')
13 Ulysses ('matrimonial gift' / 'brown mackintosh' / 'seaside girls')
14 American Gods ('little brown cat' / 'buffalo man' / 'fat kid')
15 Brave New World ('soma holiday' / 'synthetic music' / 'pleasant vices')
16 The Color Purple ('she ast' / 'talk bout' / 'new mammy')
17 Death On the Nile ('observation saloon' / 'ten minutes past one')
18 Trainspotting ('shakes his heid' / 'get ootae' / 'doss c**t')
19 The Go-between ('game larder' / 'green bicycle' / 'village team')
20 Catch 22 ('bloated colonel' / ' fifty missions')
21 The Naked Lunch ('old gash' / 'old junky' / 'sick morning')
22 On the Road ('old maestro' / 'bureau car')
23 Pride and Prejudice ('dining parlour' / 'her ladyship')
24 Tropic of Capricorn ('sour rye' / 'stiff prick' / 'little dough')
25 A Clockwork Orange ('malenky bit' / 'oddy knocky' / 'old moloko')

Thanks to Hazel for the idea