I have to admit, at first I was alarmed. Significant amounts of drug use, chemicals I've never heard of, and erratic drug induced behavior can do that to someone who leads a pretty sheltered life. After pages of mescaline, and bats in the desert sky I was wondering, "What's the point?" And then I found it. Jumbled amongst quips about life on ether and acid are surprisingly lucid narratives on the American Dream, and the loss of the 60's. The 60's stand out like a golden calf, an idol, worthy of capitalization and remembrance. Thompson represents it as a time when he found what he was looking for, nirvana, serendipity, perhaps even the American Dream. Statements that linger; "In a world of thieves, the final sin is stupidity." and " It's a wild goose-chase more or less, but personally we're dead serious." When I finally got up from the park bench after finishing it I felt strangely unaware of my surroundings, as if the word "Ether" had leapt off the page and crawled up my nose whilst I wasn't looking.