This paper discusses two contemporary novels from a narratological perspective. The Unfortunates by B.S. Johnson and S. by J.J. Abrams and Doug Dorst demonstrate inapplicability of narrative most commonly theorised as a representation of events. Instead, due to their unconventional usage of typography, multimodality and/or transmediality, they provoke daring attempts at reconceptualisations of this fundamental concept of modern narrative theory and novel studies. In addition, the two novels exemplify an increasingly common trend in contemporary fiction of undermining
the traditional understanding of the novel as a monomodal (exclusively verbal) work and selfcontained, printed entity