Vol.1 https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2538706003
Vol.2 https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2743981440
Vol.3 https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4006548657 ( )

2 stars. Sometimes engaging, clever, and entertaining. More often nonsensical and indecipherable. Just not my kind of book. Satire I didn't always get. Endless avalanche of references I didn't have the interest to research and fully appreciate. Appendices may have tied it all together a bit, but it was hard enough getting through all 3 books. ( )

This just isn't going to happen, not now.

Robert Anton Wilson's (and that other guy's) trilogy is one of those books that hovered around the edges of my awareness as a cult novel(s), and that alone was enough to prompt me to read it. I'm always in the mood for conspiracy theory, and odd-ball sensibilities are fine as long as there's a point. One hundred pages into this and I've realized, there isn't. Perhaps there will be at some point, and perhaps I'll return to this in the future, but for now, I'm done.

Look, you can make all kinds of statements about the rigidity of the novel's form, but random switching between speakers/POV without even the slightest convention to clue your reader in is risky, so there needs to be some payoff. You also risk alienating them before the payoff arrives. Well, I read one-eighth (yes, it's 800 pages) and there was no reward in sight, and in fact I found myself staying up later at night simply to avoid having to read this book. That's no way to feel about a novel. So, I'm done.

If anyone is reading this, feel free to read someone else's blurb to find out what this story is about, because I don't know. I can tell you want happened in my 100 pages (not much), but if you like the idea of interconnected conspiracy, I recommend Foucault's Pendulum, which has many qualities to recommend. Not least of them a plot.

Many years ago I tried to read this. It didn't click. I didn't get it.

12 years later I simply decided it was time to read it, no matter what. I decided I would barrel through it to get to the end of it.

And I did.

This is one of my favorite books I have ever read. Easily now in my top five.

It really is a masterpiece of whatever they decided their genre was.

You may not read it now, but you may read it later.

Lessons Learned? Be careful what you believe. :) Be careful what you see. Be careful. ( )

This book is an excellent insight into the complete insanity of the lsd hippie counter culture area. I dont care what others may say! RAW( Robert Anton Wilson) is a complete genius, albeit misunderstood and misquoted , quite often. And ignored by academia because of "CIA on campus" aka #cointelpro #oppaperclip #patriotact). -ljh aka Tlacaelel X. ( )