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Villa Incognito (Paperback)

by Tom Robbins (Author)
3.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
RRP: £9.99
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Product details

  • Paperback: 256 pages
  • Publisher: No Exit Press (1 Oct 2004)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 1842431021
  • ISBN-13: 978-1842431023
  • Product Dimensions: 19.2 x 12.8 x 2.2 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 101,354 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #7 in  Books > Fiction > Cult Authors > Robbins, Tom

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Product Description

Review
Villa Incognito is an audacious and brilliant novel that disguises its serious message with the gaudy trappings of Eastern mythology, broadly comic plot twists and the magic of the circus. Moving from the Vietnam War to the World Trade Centre, Tom Robbins continues his quest to take the wind from the sails of conservative thought. His focus shifts from nineteenth-century rural Japan, where the mythical Tanuki, a badger-like beast, indulges his appetites to hilarious effect, to contemporary America and Laos, where a trio of US deserters from the Vietnam war are about to get their apparently deserved comeuppance. Erudite digressions on theology, history, American patriotism, the socio-political structure of Southeast Asia and the conventions of political morality demonstrate the breadth of Robbins' intellect in exhilarating style. Coasting effortlessly from pure poetry to insouciant literary showing-off by way of sly digs at various sacred cows, Robbins is always entertaining and provocative. (Kirkus UK) --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Vanity Fair
Impossibly imaginative --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Average Customer Review
3.5 out of 5 stars (2 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Robbins made easy, 26 Aug 2005
By A Customer
Tom Robbins is the absolute master of the mind tickling metaphor and of rolling up philosophy into the guise of a fun, sexy romp. At least usually. In this book, however, it's as though he has lost patience with being too clever or has forgotten that Buddhist life-flow style which allowed it to roll out as an underlying message. Here you'll get the philosophy spelt out by one of the heroes very directly. It's as if Robbins is leaving a simplified decoder for readers who lacked the sensitivity to find the same messages more subtly layered beneath the apparent action in more deeply satisfying previous works (most magnificently Jitterbug Perfume). It's Robbins for beginners - and given the backward forms of formula religious dullardism sweeping the western world he's probably wise to do this - and maybe open a few eyes for whom the 'real' Robbins is simply a whole quantum beyond their experience.

If, on the other hand you were already in tune with the mind-bendingly brilliant thoughts behind Jitterbug Perfume, this is not going to appeal quite as much.... and you might ask for those beetroots over old Tanuki.
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5 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars A Spiritual Fable with Vivid Epigrams, 4 Jun 2004
By Professor Donald Mitchell "Jesus Makes Me a P... (Boston) - See all my reviews
(TOP 10 REVIEWER)      
This review is from: Villa Incognito (Hardcover)
"East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet." Mr. Robbins has taken that premise as a challenge to his ingenuity and he crafts a memorable tale to show the collision of mindsets. I particularly admired his willingness to contrast ancient religious beliefs like animism with the major established creeds. As a result, the story becomes secondary to his educational purpose . . . and that makes the book a weak one from many perspectives.

If you don't want to learn about eastern philosophies, then you will hate this book. It's taking you somewhere where you don't want to go. If you already know a lot about eastern philosophies, you will find this book is much too superficial to be interesting. If you are looking for a good story that keeps moving from page to page, you will probably be disappointed in the slow pace of describing synchronicity . . . which seems to be the author's purpose. If you want to study how to display philosophical issues in a novel, then the book is of average interest to writers and critics. I would suggest looking to Atlas Shrugged as a better way to get the point across . . . by giving the story a driving force and memorable characters.

The story develops from several perspectives, beginning with the spiritual messenger, Tanuki, embodied on earth as a tanuki, an East Asian species of wild dog with a large scrotum. Tanuki begets a child with a human woman, and impresses a seed into the child's palate. The descendant of that child becomes a circus performer who trains, what else, tanukis. From the United States, three aviators find themselves shot down and left behind in Laos. Eventually forgotten, they escape and decide to live the simple life in a mountainous region that evokes memories of James Hilton's Shangri-La in Lost Horizon. Needing to trade for the luxuries they crave, they find ways of turning the local raw materials into wealth. In the course of doing this, they find themselves ethically challenged. The circus comes to their mountain to escape the Communist purges and they meet Tanuki's descendent. Their lives intertwine in synchronous ways that suggest a Divine hand. Then the existence of the aviators is discovered by the United States. What will the authorities do?

To me the best part of the book comes in the beautiful metaphor of the cable strung across the gorge that tightrope walkers use to cross. This thin strand is the physical connection between the Villa Incognito and the "real world." Crossing the gap is safe and even entertaining when east and west combine, but can be fatal when either one takes the trip alone or in the dark.

As I finished the book, I found myself wondering why the author thought that you have to go to the East to experience it daily. Can't you simply use meditation and a changed perspective to bring the East with you in the West? He thinks not . . . but is that right?

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