SOLVED. Supposed Secret Organization Really an insane asylum [s]

[Michelle]

Has anyone read this book? I have check the bookshelf and didn't see it. In the story an intelligent but somewhat anti-social man is approached by mysterious individuals and invited to join a secret organization that does unethical research supposedly for the government. He has to abandon his life (of course) and go live in a compoun where everyone working for the company lives and works. He finally decides to escape because the research is too unethical, does so, and then is pick up by the recruiters. He is told that it is really an insane asylum that no one has ever tried to escape from.

Any help will be appreciated,
Michelle

[Michelle]

Repost.

[Christy]

Is it possible that it's "Shutter Island" by Dennis Lehane? Without spoiling the ending of "Shutter Island" your description is somewhat similar to the plotline of the Lehane book.

[Heron]

Do you know when the book would have been published, or when you read it?

[April Ann]

Genesis Echo by James Axler has similar themes, but more information about when it was published would help narrow the field.

[Abigail (42stitches)]

Kind of sounds like a movie that came out in the last couple years..."The Lazerus Project" I wonder if the movie was based on some book...

[Michelle]

Not Shutter Islands or Genesis Echo. Not the Lazerus Project. As for when it was published, I couldn't tell you. I read it about 25 years ago and I think then I picked it up at at garage sale.

[Ann aka Iftcan]

it sounds a bit like the plot line of Secret Agent too. (Old tv program)

So, if we figure 1985 or earlier, that would be about right, correct Michelle.

[Emma]

I really don't think it's Marge Piercy's Woman on the Edge of Time but it puts me in mind of that...

[Leslie]

Sorta kinda sounds like "I Am the Cheese" but probably not. The premise is very similar, and sometimes our memory of books from so long ago get mixed with tv memories and other-book-memory.

[Michelle]

Nope. None of those. The experiments that are being conducted are things like behavior control using subliminal messages in television shows and what not. The company employees (really the inmates) are discouraged from discussing what they are working on with each other. The inmates believe that there ideas are really being enacted somewhere. One guy is developing brainwashing and torture techniques. The irony of the book is that the inmates are so happy developing their "research" that they never try to leave. For some reason, a limousine picks him up along the road after he escapes and the guy inside tells him the real deal. That guy then cuts off the main characters finger for some reason I can't remember. This probably wont help, but I think the back cover was yellow (the front cover had been ripped off when I got it)

[Michelle]

I realized that I left out of the description that he joined the organization and was very happy to find an outlet for his "important ideas" until he began to find out what the other "employees" were working on. Then he gradually began to grow a conscious and desire to escape. He began to believe he was prisoner of the "company". He though he was risking his life when he escaped from the compound because "big brother was always watching". The truth was no one was watching. The inmates policed themselves.

[Michelle]

This is a repost to see if anyone has any ideas yet. Thanks for all your help!

[Andy]

This rings a faint bell - I think I saw this book at a store once years ago. Title something like "Banquet of the brainwasher's society" - but I can't find it with google.

[Michelle]

Thank you for trying!

[Diana]

It sounds a little bit like The Bumblebee Flies Anyway by Robert Cormier but I think you would have remembered if the main characters were kids.

[Kate]

There is a reverse of the situation you've described in a book To Ride Pegasus by Anne McCaffrey. People with talents are being persecuted, and an organization is formed to provide security and health services for these people. Some do need to be restrained because their talents are out of control.

It's really an enjoyable book, and takes a look at the process of guaranteeing rights for a minority group of whom may are afraid.

[Michelle]

To Diana: Yes, you are correct, the characters are not children. To Kate: Thanks for the book recommendation. I have enjoyed other McCaffrey books so I will probably love that one as well.

[Cathy]

Last Night at the Brain Thieves Ball is kind of similar -- protagonist is a scientist recruited into an organization that researches manipulation and control techniques. At first he's thrilled to be able to do research without worrying about ethics reviews and having all these resources available. I rmember that the main character gets increasingly suspicious and that there is a twist or twists revealed about the organization and its purpose - I want to say that it is something like you're describing, but it's been so long since I read the book that I can't be sure!

[Michelle]

Yay! Thank you Cathy! That is exactly it. Last Night at the Brain Thieves Ball sounded right the second I read the title so now I think the title page must have been intact.

I appreciate everyone's help.

[Andy]

Thanks, Cathy - that is exactly what I was thinking of (I was kind of close on the title...)

[Gloria Clark]

Thanks again too Cathy! Searching for this one was starting to make my brain itch!