Gene Wolfe - Return to the Whorl
read about the first 6 chapters
What a fucking series. So glad to be at the end of it, so much so I might not even give up on it out of my pathologic lack of interest. As it went on (I am speaking of the whole deal, from Book of the New Sun on), it got more and more obsessed with world-building, clever puzzles, gamer's gambits, tricks, etc. Perhaps, though, I was just wrong to think the first books presented a (hella Catholic) demonstration of cohabiting the unknowable. Perhaps Gene Wolfe got lame as he got old.