The phrase "a provocative book" is correct and usable in written English.
You can use this phrase to describe a book that contains topics, ideas, or language that is intended to provoke strong reactions from its readers. For example, "The author's latest novel is a provocative book; its exploration of controversial themes has created a stir in literary circles."
This is a provocative book that will get you to think about innovation in an entirely new way.
Perhaps he merely thought that taking a stand opposed to conventional wisdom would make for a provocative book.
Finkelstein and Silberman have themselves written a provocative book that bears the marks of a detective story.
It's a provocative image for a provocative book, one that's more insinuating than merely a greatest-hits collection of photo shoots.
He has written a provocative book questioning a central tenet of the hedge-fund industry: its performance is always worth paying for.
In 2010, the conceptual poet Vanessa Place published a provocative book called "Statement of Facts," the first volume of a three-part project.
In a provocative book-length essay, Patricia Lynne argues that most programmatic assessment of student writing in U.S. public and higher education is conceived in the terms of mid-20th century positivism.
Greenberg even refers to fiction-writing Fred as having posed for a provocative book-jacket portrait -- a reference to the supine pose the 23-year-old Capote struck for Harold Halma's attention-getting Other Voices, Other Rooms photograph.
Because it lacks the biggest-fastest-highest-scoring-most-chain-saws-juggled claims of "Guinness World Records," "Ripley's Believe It or Not!" is a less provocative book, more like a clip file of News of the Weird stories.
Chaon is a dark, provocative writer, and "Await Your Reply" is a dark, provocative book; in bringing its three strands together, Chaon has fashioned a braid out of barbed wire.
If it sounds as if effectively truncating such an intricate, provocative book into a 93-minute movie would be nearly impossible, well, the film version that has its premiere Saturday night on HBO proves the point.
