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Summary: spaced out
Review: Welcome to the woodpecker club.If you have weird questions like what's love & if you wonder how to make the crudest of bombs,this book answers all that & much more.But the real beauty of the book lies in all those things that it asks you that you would never dreamt of asking yourself.
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Summary: A brilliant man: Tom Robbins
Review: Encountering Tom Robbins for the first time, I was amazed at the incredible amount of thought put into every page. Robbins uses the most incredible metaphors of any writer, living or dead. His pure originality and crazy bouts with a new typewriter make "Still Life With Woodpecker" and incredibly entertaining and thought provoking book.
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Summary: Only read this if you enjoy thinking
Review: This was my favorite Tom Robbins book. It treats life with the same sideways view as his other works, while advancing some ideas on life and humanity that changed the way I looked at both. His thoughts on fire and why man smokes, and on love, redheads, and the moon, still keep me in contemplation on sleepless nights. I guess those sleepless nights are a part of the "last-quarter-of-the-twentieth-century blues" . . .
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Summary: A "Robbins" look at love
Review: This was the first Tom Robbins book I ever read, and I have been a devoted fan since. Robbins has the ability to feed you a thunderstorm, tell you it's true love and make you believe it and beg for more. Never have I been so engulfed by the result of an authors talents. Then again, no other author can create such a profound work of pure entertainment enveloped in intellect. A true masterpiece!
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Summary: Forget the bible, this is it!
Review: It isn't often that I enter another world when I sink my teeth into a book. This is the sort of book that puts you in a space (a pyramid, to be exact) and paints the inside of the walls with a mesmerizing story. I suggest this book to anybody who considers themselves to be a literate liberal romantic living in the latter half of the 20th century. A master in the art of sentences, Tom Robbins is a genius who deserves to be exhalted
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Summary: A Study of Redheads
Review: This is a light and entertaining book from a word-play genius. What is amazing is the way he weaves so many stories into a tidy, compact little package - almost the size of a pack of cigarettes, as a matter of fact.This is a story about a tarnished princess, an outlaw bomber with bad teeth, a scene stealing if somewhat undomesticated loyal servant, toads - both real and plastic, an exiled King and his "Oh-Oh, spaghetti-o" Queen, a CIA not-so-secret agent, an outraged Middle Eastern playboy, blackberries, Camels, Ralph Nader, pyramids and aliens from Argon. What more could you possibly want in a book? Tom Robbins has a genuine talent for words and puns, and those with active funny bones will be tickled throughout. His casual use of words like "slishy" and phrases like "I have a black belt in haiku" abound, to be discovered with unbridled delight. This is a book to be enjoyed within one lunar cycle without fear of repercussions.
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Summary: Oscar Wilde in a bong
Review: If you're looking for a smooth romance story then move on. The plot is a drug crazed raving which serves as a meagre bookshelf for Robbins to display his mastery of the absurd metaphor. Robbins writes like he's on fire - or on speed (though he hints cocaine served in plastic frogs is his drug of choice). It is at once brilliant yet impossible in large doses lest one runs the risk of an OD. His writing is brilliant, funny and much like those 3D pictures - utter nonsense which makes perfect sense when you look 3 feet past it and cross your eyes. If you follow that much you should enjoy this book.
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Summary: Reminds me of Chuck Palahniuk...
Review: The style of Tom Robbins in this book really reminds me of an older version of Chuck Palahniuk, with the bizzare story line, mixed with poetry, social commentary, and a collection or random facts...a great love story in the most unorthodox way. I've reccomended this book to everyone I know. I'm so sad that I read it in 1 day because I wanted it to go on forever....
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Summary: Tom Robbins is a New Literary Genius
Review: Still Life with Woodpecker, is, hands down, one of the most eccentric novels I have ever come across but at the same time one of the most masterful. Tom Robbins's diction is immaculate and incredibly articulate. He expresses himself with such ease while discussing various philosophical topics that are in no way easily described. He shows no shame in illustrating sexually graphic scenes and bringing up controversial subject matter that most authors would not dare to discuss. I doubt that any author would have the audacity to narrate the scene when Princess Leigh Cheri and the Woodpecker are comparing the burning glow of their fiery red pubic hairs and there is a drop of juice stuck to her single hair that had dripped from her excited "peachfish." This book is about outlaws, the dejected outlook on living in the last quarter of the twenty-first century, how to make love stay, pregnant cheerleaders who drop out of school, and the fascination with redheads. All of the types of subjects that Robbins relates to seem to only be subjects that are lingering aimlessly in the very back of your mind. However, because his writing is so zany and kitsch, it makes his erratic thoughts interesting. He says things that no one would ever think of. He keeps things alive. But this book is so much more than just some crazy story that seems to have developed from someone mumbling while they were tripping on acid. This book is about an outlook on love and on life. There is a message behind the madness. Robbins teaches you how to get past the obstacles that keep you from eternal bliss. This book has changed my outlook on a number of issues and themes. I recommend this book to anyone that has the time and energy to engage in a delightfully thought-provoking novel.
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Summary: Life changing experience? Definitely
Review: This book... there are no words to describe this book, other than the words, hidden on a pack of Camel Cigaretts. CHOICE is one of the most powerfull mesages that the Argonian redheads could muster throught the interdimensional rift between where they were exiled and where we live. The word embodies this book, you have a CHOICE to make. Do you want this book to change your life? Do you want to understand the purpose of the moon? Do you want to find yourself looking at redheads in a new light? Are you ready to find out exactly what love is, how to find it, and the ways to make it stay? Believe me I will never look the same at the moon. I can truely tell you, that I know why love doesnt stay for most. I too am going to become a missionary for this book, reccomending, and giving it to people. It really has been a life changing experience, and I am gratefull to my friend for telling me to read it.
I have never taken as much care to read every single word carefully, to understand every single sentence in a book, nor have I ever taken this long to read one. I read it off and on for 4 months. I have never felt so good when finishing a book as I did with this one, it was an accomplishment, like ending up where you intended after an adventure, but still bieng enriched by the experience, and gaining new wisdom and knowledge from it. I do not mean to attack the people who have written the other reviews, but if you didnt like this book you obveously didnt get the point, or scope of it, or are too narrow minded to look at it from multiple perspectives and read the underlying connections throughout the book.
I am both happy and proud to say that I have, since reading this book been mistaken for a redhead. Perhaps its all the snappy quotes I have picked up from the book, or the new insight on how to look at inanimate objects. The book ends so well, that even if I wanted to ruin the book for you and tell you what happens, it wouldnt work, because the point of the book isnt at the end, its throughout the book, the end is just the time where the pieces fall into place.
The most affecting part of the book for me was the powerfull last 2 quotes. Eerily potent and appropriate. i picked up this book expecting a good story, I ended up with much much more.
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