Rating: 
Summary: Just About the best book ever
Review: Words can't even describe how wonderful this book is! Robbins best book by far.
Rating: 
Summary: In bed with Xaviera Hollander
Review: Splendid. ...Briefly the book tells you that by eating right, exercising in a special way, and thinking positively you can live up to 1000 years and may be more. What the book doesn't tell you is what good would such a life be. A life devoid of adultery, booze, prostitutes, tobacco, awfully-bad-for-you, cruelly killed roasted baby lamb. Living such a life may be bad enough for even half of a millennium... :) The book is good, very good. And one of the rare examples of an author that knows his language better than most readers. It is however somewhat void of meaning. Just as the author accuses the modern Mardi Gras of being a "sham" because it has become void of meaning. This book I enjoyed the way I enjoy call-girls. Young, beautiful, experienced, willing to please, cared for, and whatever you want to call her, [it] will not be nearly as good as [it] with a woman one had to earn. Jitterbug perfume was pleasent to read but had the book taught me anything new? Except few English words, not really. Which sets this book apart from, say, Kazantzakis' Zorbas, Hasek's Svejk, Twain's Huckleberry, Bulgakov's Master and Margarita, and Steinbeck's Tortilla Flat et al. As exquisite as Jitterbug Perfume is for me it'll never make this list. But hey, read it, by all means read it. P.S. Any errors in the language above or just plain bad English are to be blamed on me and not my English teacher who is the most wonderful woman that teaches English on this little planet of ours.
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Summary: Mysterious, funny, magical, thought-provoking
Review: Robbins' best. Has all the unique qualities of Robbins fiction -- incredible, all over the map plot, writing that goes for it, thought-provoking hippy philosophy.
Rating:
Summary: A gem...
Review: Damn, if Tom Robbins' "Jitterbug Perfume" isn't one of the most original, beautifully written books I've ever discovered! It is a novel that manages to be classical, comical, and comtemporary at the same time. To say that the plot involves a century-hoping effort to bottle and market the spirit of youth is like saying "Being John Malcovich" is the story of an actor's life. Part of what makes this book irresistable is its clever and lyrical language. Robbins describes a character getting out of a spring this way: "when he surfaced, spewing and sputtering, dead leaves and the addresses of a dozen hibernating frogs strewn throughout his beard...". He describes one character's internal experience this way: "... inside her swelling head... a music was rising, a happiness was rising; her dumpy old heart was rising, made buoyant and girlish again, a lost beach ball blown miles across a levee, illuminated by heat lightening." The book is amazing, really. I'm not sure I've ever seen a more unusual plot handled so deftly, or read a book with as full a canvas of unusual characters and locations. Most of all, the language will keep you hooked from sentence to sentence. There could be no plot at all and you would still keep reading.
Rating:
Summary: The Elixir Of Life
Review: _Jitterbug Perfume_ is Tom Robbins' droll, absurdist, and often hallucinatory vision of man's continual quest for eternal youth and immortality. Wiggs Dannyboy, a Timothy Leary-like man (with an Irish brogue which keeps fading in and out) theorizes that humans have evolved from the brutish reptile, to the higher level mammal, to finally the highest plane of all: flower loving creatures, motivated by their olifactory powers, who no longer believe in violence and war. He hypothesizes that people with the greatest longevity have, among other traits, abolished death and dying from their lexicon. He also gives strong credence to the restorative powers of flowers and other odors. Dannyboy utilizes as his paragon Alobar, a former king, whom he meets while both of them are serving time in prison. Both Alobar and his equally youthful wife, Kudra, have already been living a thousand years and both, in their earlier years, escaped execution: King Alobar due to showing signs of aging and Kudra, narrowingly escaping ritual burning because of the death of her first husband. A Parisian perfumer and a New Orleans perfume retailer hope to recreate the scintillating, elusive, and soon to prove very significant odor of the few drops of perfume (formulated by Kudra many years before) still remaining in an ancient and exotic bottle that was recently retrieved from the sea, and which had the likeness of Pan, the Greek God of the woodlands and the flocks on it. Tom Robbins works on a vast canvas. The novel begins in Europe during the Dark Ages, then journeys to India, then back to Bohemia. The contemporary sections of the book transport the reader to Paris and New Orleans and back. The author deftly recounts the various myths and legends of ancient times related to love, sex, longevity, and the negative impact of religious influences. Pan figures strongly throughout the book, although Pan has been slowly fading from existence due to the public's loss of interest in him. In the old days Pan had an allegedly stimulating sexual affect on those he passed by while serenading them on his flute. The final irony is that although Pan eventually fades altogether in the modern world, his influence still remains strong, as does the desire to enhance one's youthfulness and sexual attraction.
Rating:
Summary: Simple Pleasure
Review: Jitterbug Perfume may be an epic, as described on the outer cover, but it lacks the formal narrative associated with this style of text. Weaving his way through the ages, following the characters as they change before your eyes, and examining the grisly wonder of death, Tom Robbins is at his best. I appreciate all of his books, so there is no surprise that I liked this as well. What was surprising was the immediate urge to re-read, rare in this reader. I emphatically recommend this book and think any Robbins fan (or really any reader) will certainly enjoy this masterpiece.
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Summary: Lend this book to others, but keep one for yourself!
Review: Rarely have I read any book more than once. I have read Jitterbug Pefume 4 times. I have lent it to many friends, but kept one for myself. My copy has been underlined, highlighted, dog-eared and notated in the margins many times. This isn't just a story about immortality; this is a commentary about how to live Life NOW. I have quoted this book many times in my own writing, as I appreciate Robbins' unconventional yet sage approach to Life. Alobar and Kudra are the consummate Hedonists, and want their lives to mean something as well. Their journey back to each other is remarkable. My life has been altered by great books like Jitterbug Perfume. That is the true purpose of great writing. Any other kind of writing is slag and rots the mind.
Rating:
Summary: My Bible
Review: If you've started to take life to seriously, to the point that you might even think yourself mortal, this book is the antedote. Wrapped up in all the fizzing metaphors, sexy romps, historical beetroots and throwaway gags, you'll find Buddhism with a sense of humour, spirituality with human warmth and everything you need to inspire you once conventional religion proves insufficient. And it's a good story too.
Rating:
Summary: All that's good.
Review: This book made me laugh and think constantly. Tom Robbins is a rare writer who seems to get better the more self-indulgent he gets (a theory disproved in his recent work). The guy has a tendancy to birdwalk with his narratives, if only to make a few points, or ten. It's that he never loses you through all the changes of scenery and mentality that happen here that's impressive. But it's the way this book get your mind buzzing that makes it great.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent choice for those open minded enough to enjoy it
Review: Robbins is a true American gift. He again restores the individual sentence back to the pedestal provided by predecessors like Thoreau and Nietzsche. If you like the quick and conversational style of Hemmingway then perhaps you should leave this on the shelf, but if not then you won't be disappointed by lines that capture the imagination by twisting the language, drawing the scene, and often delving deep into the sexual nature of human thought at each turn. Jitterbug Perfume follows a story line that is split across time and space through the olfactories of our atypical cast. Whether or not you care about perfume or beets you will be drawn into this tale of ambition, love, and longevity.
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