History BLAM / Literature

* There's that uncomfortable and unnerving "Vodka" chapter that comes the eff out of nowhere late in ''Literature/HisDarkMaterials''. Will, a 12 or 13 year old boy, is traveling alone. He stops at the house of an old priest to ask for directions. The priest pushes him into accepting a drink of vodka, chats in an overly friendly manner, is very touchy-feely, tries to convince Will to stay a while and is just generally creepy. After few pages of this, Will insists on leaving and the man gives him a hug and lets him go. There is no mention of the incident or the old man ever again.
** This was a jab at the Catholic Church, referencing their rampant sexual abuse of children.

* OlderThanFeudalism: At the end of book 19 of Creator/{{Homer}}'s ''Literature/TheIliad'', as Achilles hitches up his horses to go into battle, he prays that they will bring him back safely like they didn't do for his fallen friend. In response, the horse Roan Beauty suddenly gains the power of speech, simply to tell him "yeah, alright, this time. But next battle, you're doomed, buddy." Aside from a moment of surprise, Achilles barely seems to notice his brand-new talking horse; Roan Beauty loses speech as suddenly as he gained it, and the incident is never, ever mentioned again.

** Many of the BLAMs in the first editions of L. Frank Baum's and subsequently Ruth Plumly Thompson's Oz books are not the author's fault, but that of illustrator John R. Neill. Neill's illustrations frequently do not sync up with descriptions of people, place, and things which the authors provided. A truly bizarre example comes in the early chapters of ''The Scarecrow of Oz'', in which on old man and a little girl go on a ''Gilligan's Island''-style boat trip gone wrong. Neill chose to pepper the adventure with gratuitous scenes of an attractive, well-built, not-quite-human lady in the water, with fins on her arms (a la Aquaman) and on the sides of her head (like Flash wings or Catwoman ears). She is wholly Neill's own creation, as the text mentions no character beyond the two boaters in this part of the story, and no mermaid/nereid/selkie/whatever in any other part. But while the mysterious swimming champ is weird enough in her own right, the crowning BLAM moment is the full-page illustration preceding chapter one, in which she is riding a whitewater wave which strategically covers her lower body, except for a "window" which gives us an unobstructed view of her bare buttocks, adding an inexplicable act of [[Mooning/Main "Mooning"]] to the Oz books.

** Many of the BLAMs in the first editions of L. Frank Baum's and subsequently Ruth Plumly Thompson's Oz books are not the author's fault, but that of illustrator John R. Neill. Neill's illustrations frequently do not sync up with descriptions of people, place, and things which the authors provided. A truly bizarre example comes in the early chapters of ''The Scarecrow of Oz'', in which on old man and a little girl go on a ''Gilligan's Island''-style boat trip gone wrong. Neill chose to pepper the adventure with gratuitous scenes of an attractive, well-built, not-quite-human lady in the water, with fins on her arms (a la Aquaman) and on the sides of her head (like Flash wings or Catwoman ears). She is wholly Neill's own creation, as the text mentions no character beyond the two boaters in this part of the story, and no mermaid/nereid/selkie/whatever in any other part. But while the mysterious swimming champ is weird enough in her own right, the crowning BLAM moment is the full-page illustration preceding chapter one, in which she is riding a whitewater wave which strategically covers her lower body, except for a "window" which gives us an unobstructed view of her bare buttocks, adding an inexplicable act of [[Main/Mooning "Mooning"]] to the Oz books.

** Many of the BLAMs in the first editions of L. Frank Baum's and subsequently Ruth Plumly Thompson's Oz books are not the author's fault, but that of illustrator John R. Neill. Neill's illustrations frequently do not sync up with descriptions of people, place, and things which the authors provided. A truly bizarre example comes in the early chapters of ''The Scarecrow of Oz'', in which on old man and a little girl go on a ''Gilligan's Island''-style boat trip gone wrong. Neill chose to pepper the adventure with gratuitous scenes of an attractive, well-built, not-quite-human lady in the water, with fins on her arms (a la Aquaman) and on the sides of her head (like Flash wings or Catwoman ears). She is wholly Neill's own creation, as the text mentions no character beyond the two boaters in this part of the story, and no mermaid/nereid/selkie/whatever in any other part. But while the mysterious swimming champ is weird enough in her own right, the crowning BLAM moment is the full-page illustration preceding chapter one, in which she is riding a whitewater wave which strategically covers her lower body, except for a "window" which gives us an unobstructed view of her bare buttocks, adding an inexplicable act of Mooning to the Oz books.

** In ''The Patchwork Girl of Oz,'' the protagonists come across a cabin on a deserted stretch of the Yellow Brick Road. A disembodied voice begrudgingly agrees to provide them with food and shelter for the night. The titular Patchwork Girl annoys the unseen host and winds up locked outside overnight, where she sees a large wolf come to the door several times. In the morning, the travelers who spent the night inside realize they still feel hungry and tired, as if they hadn't eaten or slept at all. None of this is elaborated on, they don't lose a day to actually rest or eat, and Ojo doesn't even complain about the experience (which makes it one of the few things he doesn't complain about).

* ''Literature/MakingMoney'' has an InUniverse version: A tense courtroom scene is interrupted by the President of the Royal Mint of Ankh-Morpork -- who happens to be a [[MisterMuffykins small bug-eyed dog]] named Mr. Fusspot -- being slowly propelled from one side of the room to the other by the... oscillations of a large mechanical vibrator clutched in its mouth. The sheer surrealism of the moment convinces the protagonist to make a huge gamble in the court case, since if such a thing is possible, anything is.

* The ''Literature/ConanTheBarbarian'' novel ''Literature/TheHourOfTheDragon'' features Conan seeking to reclaim the throne of Aquilonia, and being forced to travel across Hyborea to Heart of Ahriman from several people. At one point, it ends up in the Temple of Set, and Conna ventures inside. He meets an ancient vampire named Akivasha, who attempts to seduce him. He flees and gets on with the plot, and Akivasaha is never brought up again, and had nothing to do with anything else in the story -- there was just a random scene with Conan being seduced by a hot vampire lady and walking away.

* Mervyn Peake's ''Literature/{{Gormenghast}}'' series has many random scenes, where characters are introduced and conduct pointless dialogues, or new locations are visited and lovingly described, and are then never mentioned again. Considering that he only finished two of the five planned books and only one additional one was made (by his wife), this might be a case of foreshadowing destroyed by AuthorExistenceFailure.

* ''Literature/DiaryOfAWimpyKidTheLastStraw'': Greg lampshades this with Fregley coming out of nowhere with icing on his face and saying '''''"BOOGIE! BOOGIE! BOOGIE!"'''''

* In ''[[Literature/TheEnchantedForestChronicles Dealing With Dragons]]'', when Cimorene is running away from her unwanted marriage, she follows a [[ItMakesSenseInContext talking frog's advice]] on the way to go. Along the way, she passes a fancy pavilion where an unseen person invites her to come in and rest. Though Cimorene is tired and tempted, she remembers that she was specifically warned to stay away from the pavilion. She walks past it and...that's it. Nothing else comes of her not falling for it, there's no indicator of what ''would'' have happened, and the pavilion and woman in it are never brought up again.

* In ''Literature/JamesAndTheGiantPeach,'' James enjoys time with father and mother. Until, they are [[spoiler:killed by an escaped rhinoceros.]] It's never mentioned again.

* Near the beginning of ''Fellowship of the Ring'' we get this bit with a fox. Not only it is never referenced again, but it doesn't really fit the tone of the book at all, feeling more like something out of ''Literature/TheHobbit''.

* In the novel ''Literature/HowlsMovingCastle'', Howl, Sophie, and Michael take a trip from the fantasy land of Ingary to 1980s Wales, where Howl is from. An entire chapter is focused on this trip, giving descriptions of computer games and cars. The revelation that our world exists in the story's universe and the journey itself come completely out of nowhere. Although later on in the book it is mentioned that Howl visits Wales, the inclusion of Wales had nothing to do with the story, since it could just as well have taken place within Ingary without affecting the plot. The two sequels, "Castle in the Air" and "House of Many Ways," are not affected by the journey.

* ''The Wolves in the Walls'' is quite a short picture book, but it still manages to fit in a big-lipped alligator moment. When Lucy makes her bold suggestion for dealing with the wolves, she gets a shocked reaction from everybody: from her father, from her mother, from her brother, and from "the Queen of Melanesia, who had dropped by to help with the gardening". That's the only mention of the Queen of Melanesia in the entire book; there's no lead-up to her appearance, and she has no effect on the plot.

* ''Discworld/MakingMoney'' has an InUniverse version: A tense courtroom scene is interrupted by the President of the Royal Mint of Ankh-Morpork -- who happens to be a [[MisterMuffykins small bug-eyed dog]] named Mr. Fusspot -- being slowly propelled from one side of the room to the other by the... oscillations of a large mechanical vibrator clutched in its mouth. The sheer surrealism of the moment convinces the protagonist to make a huge gamble in the court case, since if such a thing is possible, anything is.

* The scene in ''Discworld/TheColourOfMagic'' where Rincewind and Twoflower's dragon disappears, and Rincewind somehow wills them to Roundworld, where they're on an aeroplane that's been hijacked and are named Dr Rjinswand and Jack Zweiblumen. When the Luggage appears to threaten the hijacker Rjinswand wishes he were somewhere else and they're back on the Disc, with the only evidence of this scene being that they're not in the same place they were in when the dragon disappeared (although still falling) and the Luggage now bears the "powerful travelling rune T.W.A." Even for a RandomEventsPlot, it's kind of disconnected from everything around it. The TV and comicbook adaptations both skip it entirely.

* The ''Franchise/BattleTechExpandedUniverse'' novel ''Far Country'' departs from the BlackAndGreyMorality WarIsHell, [[AbsentAliens human-only]] action the series is known for, and instead features a race of intelligent pre-industrial BirdPeople, the Tetatae, that were found by a wrecked jumpship after a BlindJump. WordOfGod states that the story remains canonical, but they have no intention of returning or even mentioning them (the jumpship was regarded as [[HyperspaceIsAScaryPlace lost in transit]]), feeling that aliens do not fit within the greater universe.

* The entire two or three chapters featuring the hobbits' adventures with Tom Bombadil in ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings'' is a very lengthy BLAM chiefly about singing excruciatingly bad folk songs and talking about how awesome Goldberry is. Actual connections to the plot of the rest of the book amount to: (a) the One Ring doesn't work on Bombadil - which gets ''one'' mention at the Council of Elrond - and (b) leaving the Old Forest you might trip over a wight and wind up with a [[CoolSword cool Numenoréan sword]].
** May not qualify because the sequence with Bombadil and the wight does explain why the ''cool Numenoréan sword'' had enchantments on it capable of [[spoiler: unbinding the Witch King's undead flesh and making him vulnerable to an ordinary sword long enough to be killed]].
** There's a smaller one in ''Fellowship of the Ring'' when the party is struggling to climb blizzard-ridden Caradhras. Legolas announces that he's "going south to find the sun" and runs off across the top of the snow. He comes back a little bit later explaining that the sun is warm and happy down south and can't be bothered to thwart the blizzard.
*** Although it's clear in context that Legolas is not saying the Sun has actually wandered off somewhere, but only finding a laughing way to say that the storm is confined to the mountain, and the Fellowship doesn't have to go very far to get out of it.
** Near the beginning of ''Fellowship of the Ring'' we get this bit with a fox. Not only it is never referenced again, but it doesn't really fit the tone of the book at all, feeling more like something out of ''Literature/TheHobbit''.

* In addition to a number of WackyWaysideTribe incidents, one can probably find a number of Big Lipped Alligator Moments in Creator/LFrankBaum's [[Literature/LandOfOz Oz books]].

* In addition to a number of WackyWaysideTribe incidents, one can probably find a number of Big Lipped Alligator Moments in Creator/LFrankBaum's [[Literature/LandOfOz Oz books]]. The first book, ''Literature/{{The Wonderful Wizard of Oz}}'', has the China Country, where all the inhabitants are made out of china. Some of them, such as the singing china clown, have been broken and mended several times. They neither help nor hinder Dorothy and her friends, they are introduced out of nowhere and have nothing to do with the story, and they're never mentioned again in the book afterward (or in any of the later Oz books, for that matter). Things like this add to the unnerving dream-logic of the story. A surviving earlier draft doesn't include this adventure at all (and, tellingly, neither do ''Literature/TalesOfTheMagicLand''), and it may have been added just to pad out the book.

* Oh course, this happens in Creator/ThomasPynchon novels all the time, in fact, BLAM's may get more page space than the novel's "plot" itself, leading one to wonder whether it is, in fact, the plot of any Pynchon novel that is a BLAM to be compared against the self-consistent cohesion of the otherwise unrelated, ubiquitous absurdities.

** There are actually several bizarre encounters in the cellars of the opera house. They are all BLAM's to some extent, but their main purpose is probably to give the feeling that the protagonists are leaving the real world and are on the Phantom's turf now. Note that Christine's description of her first journey into the cellars, features some fairly strange and hellish imagery too. Some critics have seen the journey into the opera house cellars to be evoking ''Literature/TheDivineComedy'', and Dante's descent through the CirclesOfHell, so if this is the case, at least the BLAM's have some purpose to them.