Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Was there something in my drink?, March 6, 2001
This review is from: Wisdom's maw: The acid novel (Paperback)
This is, firstly, an entertaining read. Secondly, it's funny. Thirdly, the subject matter has had just about every other kind of treatment at the hands of writers over the years, so why not find room on your "drug shelf" for this? File somewhere between "The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test" and "Acid Dreams". There's more than one way of getting a feel for the era covered by this book, the "Acid Age", and there'll be more "facts" available in other works. So do you want to be entertained while getting a slightly screwy version of what happened? Buy this book! And don't take the brown acid, man.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
7 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
The literary equivalent of a bad trip, September 4, 2000
This review is from: Wisdom's maw: The acid novel (Paperback)
This book was awful. Passing itself off as "The Acid Novel," it details the hidden side of the 1960s: Ken Kesey, Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassady, and Alan Ginsberg were all Government dupes, whether they knew it or not. The CIA is behind them all, trying to create a superman through LSD. An interesting idea, maybe, but Fahey destroys the entire concept with his incredibly ham-fisted and labored writing. Luckily though, he keeps the book short. Rumor is that this book was turned down by nearly every major publisher because they feared it might be incriminating; Fahey uses the real names of all the dead personages, such as John Kennedy and Jack Kerouac, etc, but uses fake names for those who are still alive (save for Hunter Thompson): Ken Kesey becomes Franklin Moore, Alan Ginsberg (who was alive when this was published) becomes Carlo Marx, etc. But it's still obvious who these characters really are, and therein lies the reason behind the publishers' supposed worry. I think the real reason this book wasn't picked up by a major publisher, though, is because it's atrociously written. Fahey uses the most hackneyed metaphors and descriptions, and his grammar isn't the greatest either. Commas appear to break up sentences where they aren't even needed, and I feel like I'm reading something by a junior high student who's really, really trying. As the book progresses, what happened in real history is changed around, with Kesey's character spending time in jail before being abducted by Government operatives whom intend to erase his existance; a rescue maneuver right out of some lame action film ensues. And that's another thing: Fahey throws in these useless action scenes throughout the book, obviously trying to spice things up (as if his concept wasn't interesting enough), but these action scenes just come off as forced and unecessary. And finally: the About the Author page, at the very end of the book, which is very obviously written by Fahey, claims that the author doesn't submit his material to writing contests because that's not the sort of thing he does, so this is why he's never won a writing award. Sure. Maybe he should start submitting to them, and when he doesn't win, he can suspect yet another conspiracy, one which is laboring to keep him out of print, to keep his wild ideas away from the public eye. Now, that's my kind of conspiracy!
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
|
|
|
