Sometimes a Great Notion

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Summary: Possibly the best work of American fiction
Review: Like other reviewers have said, this is a book that deserves to be read again and again. It is a rich, thoughtful, and brazen exploration into what it means to be a man.

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Summary: Enlightenment, in both the story and the style.
Review: I've read this beautiful work several times over the past 20 years or so, and each reading has been an epiphany. Perhaps it's time to pick it up again . . .

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Summary: music and poetry in the language
Review: It's been years since I read this, but it is time to read it again.
The scene comparing the logger trapped under a log in the river with the sandpiper snatching food and then fleeing from the encroaching waves is so poetic that it reminds me of the best of Walt Whitman's work.

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Summary: rugged individualist in modern society
Review: "Sometimes a Great Notion" by Ken Kesey is a fascinating tale about the last rugged individualists in the modern society and economy. I can't imagine why this book is not revered by Libertarians. But don't let that scare you. This is a terrific book, my all-time favorite.

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Summary: Sometimes a Great Notion IS the great American novel
Review: This book has everything that makes up classic literature -- man against man, man against nature, man against himself. It is told in a style that is both simultaneously homespun and phantasmagorical. It took me three tries to get past the first chapter. Don't fight it -- put it down, rest and try again. It WILL click. After 12 subsequent readings I can say it is worth it.

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Summary: The most influential book in my education as a writer
Review: It took at least two tries before I understood the scope of the text in front of me. I first read this book on a recommendation, nothing else. I wondered what was going to happen, and subsequently missed what did happen. Kesey produces a masterpiece, relating the story from every imaginable point of view. Take the time to savor the story, feed on the words, and this novel will change your life

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Summary: Never give a inch...
Review: ...even when you risk losing everything. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is more celebrated, perhaps because it's more easily accessible, but Sometimes a Great Notion is the best work of fiction I've ever read. Everything I could hope for in a novel is here, tied up in one seamless package: awesome mastery of language, indelible characterization, completely convincing multiple points of view (including, in one moving passage, the dog), intricate, airtight plot, devastating emotional impact. This is the Great American Novel. It's little wonder Kesey dropped out when it was finished

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Summary: Astonishing- technically brilliant use of language
Review: I have read it straight through several times, and in addition I am constantly picking it up to dip into. The ue of language is so dazzling that passages taken at random still have the power to grip the attention and move you...hard to know what else to say, but it's Kesey's best book and one of the best I have ever read in English. (Having said that, when I first picked it up I couldn't get anywhere it took a two year wait before I really started to get it...

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Summary: Best of Kesey's works
Review: This is Kesey's best work. I don't know why but this is my favorite book, ranks right up their with Twain's Huckleberry Finn. Like Huckleberry it has a lot to say about personal freedom and making up your own mind. We are all shackled by what others think, this book in a small way helps you to break those shackles. It is a book that can change your outlook. There has been some flack about weak women characters but I don't really find Viv very weak. Also some flack about drug induced ramblings but I think this is always a cop out. How many times have people said this is weird stuff he must be on drugs. The work stands on its artistic merits. I may be wrong but I think drugs have little if anything to do with what you really need and that is artistic talent. This is a must read. I have read it three times and never tire of the work

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Summary: Kesey's GREAT AMERICAN NOVEL
Review: This is a book which enables and inspires the reader to be "as big as he feels he's got it in him to be" (to steal from the author's description of the setting of this epic tale). It's one of the most brilliantly and beautifully crafted works I've ever encountered, and it keeps getting better with each reading. But what happened to Molly the dog