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Amnesia Moon
In Jonathan Lethem's wryly funny novel, we meet a young man named Chaos, who's living in a movie theater in post-apocalyptic Wyoming, drinking alcohol, and eating food out of cans.
It's an unusual and at times unbearable existence, but Chaos soon discovers that his post-nuclear reality may have no connection to the truth. So he takes to the road with a girl named Melinda in order to find answers. As the pair travels through the United States they find that, while each town has been affected differently by the mysterious source of the apocalypse, none of the people they meet can fill in their incomplete memories or answer their questions. Gradually, figures from Chaos's past, including some who appear only under the influence of intravenously administered drugs, make Chaos remember some of his forgotten life as a man named Moon.
It's an unusual and at times unbearable existence, but Chaos soon discovers that his post-nuclear reality may have no connection to the truth. So he takes to the road with a girl named Melinda in order to find answers. As the pair travels through the United States they find that, while each town has been affected differently by the mysterious source of the apocalypse, none of the people they meet can fill in their incomplete memories or answer their questions. Gradually, figures from Chaos's past, including some who appear only under the influence of intravenously administered drugs, make Chaos remember some of his forgotten life as a man named Moon.
247 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 1995
61 people are currently reading
2,532 people want to read
About the author
Jonathan Lethem
246 books2,598 followersJonathan Allen Lethem (born February 19, 1964) is an American novelist, essayist and short story writer.
His first novel, Gun, with Occasional Music, a genre work that mixed elements of science fiction and detective fiction, was published in 1994. It was followed by three more science fiction novels. In 1999, Lethem published Motherless Brooklyn, a National Book Critics Circle Award-winning novel that achieved mainstream success. In 2003, he published The Fortress of Solitude, which became a New York Times Best Seller.
In 2005, he received a MacArthur Fellowship
His first novel, Gun, with Occasional Music, a genre work that mixed elements of science fiction and detective fiction, was published in 1994. It was followed by three more science fiction novels. In 1999, Lethem published Motherless Brooklyn, a National Book Critics Circle Award-winning novel that achieved mainstream success. In 2003, he published The Fortress of Solitude, which became a New York Times Best Seller.
In 2005, he received a MacArthur Fellowship
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 361 reviews
August 14, 2024
An ode to Philip K. Dick, this is a funny and slick little novel about a man named Chaos, calls himself Everett, a woman named Melinda who travels with him to search for who survived an apocalyptical war across the United States, and finally a villain named Kellogg who is the keeper of sustenance for those who survived, or maybe the apocalypse didn’t happen at all? Realities and fantasies begin to blur, hence Chaos’ amnesia may be that he is called Moon? This is one trippy little book by Lethem’s that really shows a love of Philip K Dick as part of a prolific career.
April 4, 2021
CRITIQUE:
The Fat Man in (at the End of) Post-History
Once again, Jonathan Lethem uses genre to explore and test his talent for world-building, narrative construction and dialogue.
This time, it's a post-apocalyptic dystopia. Some sort of disaster has occurred. A break? Perhaps, a bomb? An alien invasion? Nobody seems to know.
Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine
The narrative commences in the desert of Wyoming in the small town of Hatfork, and heads west on a road trip, through another green world, via conformist government-run Vacaville, until it finally reaches the weird scenes of San Francisco (including the best party scene in fiction since William Gaddis and Thomas Pynchon):
The Paper Bag of Solipsism
It's ironic that everywhere the environment is so precisely portrayed, yet somehow the novel suggests that all is solipsism.
It's unclear whether everything is occurring in the mind of the apparent protagonist, Chaos/ Everett/Moon, or perhaps in the mind of a psychically domineering fat man, an almost archetypal messianic dreamer called Kellogg, who projects dreams that appear to control everybody else.
Alternatively, as in any novel, it's possible that everything is just happening in the mind of the author, and/or, by extension or extrapolation, is it's just happening in the mind of the reader.
Conversely, are readers the only thing that can liberate writers from their solipsism (or vice versa)?
"For my living I climb into and then punch my way out of the paper bag of my solipsism on a daily basis."
- Jonathan Lethem
Somebody to Love
Chaos/Everett wonders whether we are more than our memories of other people. Perhaps, we are our interactions with others, an other, the other?
Chaos/Everett finds himself in his relationships with Gwen (San Francisco), Edie (Vacaville), and Dawn (San Francisco):
Rest Your Head on a Surrealistic Pillow
At times, reading the novel seems to be like wandering around inside a Salvador Dali painting.
The novel could be fruitfully paired with one of my favourite works of fiction, Angela Carter's "The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman".
Salvador Dalí, Mae West's face which may be used as a Surrealist apartment, 1934-35. © Salvador Dali
SOUNDTRACK:
The Fat Man in (at the End of) Post-History
Once again, Jonathan Lethem uses genre to explore and test his talent for world-building, narrative construction and dialogue.
This time, it's a post-apocalyptic dystopia. Some sort of disaster has occurred. A break? Perhaps, a bomb? An alien invasion? Nobody seems to know.
"There's no one explanation, Everett. People remember some kind of disaster. But there's no agreement on what it was..."
"Don't worry about it. It's like a jump cut in a movie. Everyone is missing something."
"I've been getting these dreams ever since the break..."
"Living under the regime of an eccentric dreamer may be better than suffering through the disjointed, amnesiac period that followed the disaster."
"As in previous eras, the leaders are not necessarily those who are wisest or strongest. They are the ones with a certain fixity of vision. And with the most comforting explanation for the disaster."
Weird Scenes Inside the Goldmine
The narrative commences in the desert of Wyoming in the small town of Hatfork, and heads west on a road trip, through another green world, via conformist government-run Vacaville, until it finally reaches the weird scenes of San Francisco (including the best party scene in fiction since William Gaddis and Thomas Pynchon):
"The map is not the territory, man."
"San Francisco...[was]...a city of erasures."
"Basically a lot of the old connections between things fell away, which gave people a chance to make up new ones. But the new ones don't always stick."
"It's very local. I'm sure you've noticed how local things can get nowadays."
"You know, the weirdness came out, that's all. It's not like it wasn't always there..."
"The dreams seemed designed, either by the computer or by some part of his sleeping self, to nudge him towards speculations about his life before...they confused him...He suspected that some of it was just dreams, not actual memories. Anyway, he'd learned by now to distrust dreams and memories both. Both could be inauthentic."
"What did his attachment to Cale and Gwen mean if he could barely remember them? Who was he, if all he knew of himself was the shreds of memory that clung to these people?"
"In America everybody's already wandering around lost. Even before the changes."
"Keep me from forgetting. Don't let me get lost like that again."
"A gestalt urge for coherence, after the rupture."
The Paper Bag of Solipsism
It's ironic that everywhere the environment is so precisely portrayed, yet somehow the novel suggests that all is solipsism.
It's unclear whether everything is occurring in the mind of the apparent protagonist, Chaos/ Everett/Moon, or perhaps in the mind of a psychically domineering fat man, an almost archetypal messianic dreamer called Kellogg, who projects dreams that appear to control everybody else.
"And there's the dreamstuff, you know. The Man got into everybody's head, so I guess everybody got a look at how severely neurotic The Man actually was..."
"Sane and real only go so far these days."
Alternatively, as in any novel, it's possible that everything is just happening in the mind of the author, and/or, by extension or extrapolation, is it's just happening in the mind of the reader.
Conversely, are readers the only thing that can liberate writers from their solipsism (or vice versa)?
"For my living I climb into and then punch my way out of the paper bag of my solipsism on a daily basis."
- Jonathan Lethem
Somebody to Love
Chaos/Everett wonders whether we are more than our memories of other people. Perhaps, we are our interactions with others, an other, the other?
Chaos/Everett finds himself in his relationships with Gwen (San Francisco), Edie (Vacaville), and Dawn (San Francisco):
"I came back to [San Francisco] to find her [Gwen], and I found her. And what I found there, in her arms, whatever the surrounding conditions, was real. Is real."
"I thought I was coming back to something, if I came back here. To a self."
"Who you are isn't a matter of memories, anyway...It's what you do. Your choices. Who you make yourself into."
"You're Everett, in love with Gwen. Everett with Gwen. Just like I'm Gwen with Everett, Gwen for Everett. Do you love me, Everett?"
Rest Your Head on a Surrealistic Pillow
At times, reading the novel seems to be like wandering around inside a Salvador Dali painting.
The novel could be fruitfully paired with one of my favourite works of fiction, Angela Carter's "The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman".
Salvador Dalí, Mae West's face which may be used as a Surrealist apartment, 1934-35. © Salvador Dali
SOUNDTRACK:
April 22, 2023
I've read many a novel where the core theme is the search for identity, but nothing quite like this. It was described in some quarters as The Wizard of Oz meets road noir, and I guess when it comes to dreams, certainly, and that road novel feel I can see the point. There isn't a Tin Man or a Scarecrow to speak of, but there is a mutant girl covered in a fine silky fur, so that at least gets close to the Lion. For Chaos/Everett Moon—a life with Gwen?....memories of a house by a lake?—existence is a sphere of reality and unreality; of sanity, insanity and confusion, as fragmented pieces of a deeper mystery in his mind start to take shape as he traverses this strange post-apocalyptic landscape, with no idea of what happened and how he arrived there. Environmental disaster? Aliens? Nuclear fallout?
When it comes to post-apocalyptic novels then this has nothing in common with the bleaker realism of something like Cormac McCarthy's The Road. This is more Studio Ghibli meets Philip K. Dick when compared to that. When you consider there is a talking clock, a talking Bonsai tree, televangelist robots, aircraft that fire pink goo, dream controllers, and vials containing people that are stored in a fridge and can be intravenously shot like a drug, its roots clearly lie in science fiction. Lethem stretches his imagination here, and uses these bizarre scenarios as a platform to write a critique on American culture. Although I've always admired him for his originality, some of his later novels I haven't found to be that great—even abandoning his latest, The Arrest. I've yet to read anything that tops the brilliant Motherless Brooklyn, but this earlier work from the mid 90s was a real strange and surreal experience that I thoroughly enjoyed.
May 14, 2016
Throughout the years Jonathan Lethem has made no secret of the high regard that he holds for Philip K. Dick. The MacArthur grant winner has edited and written the introduction for the Library of America anthologies of Dick's work and written several great articles about the mad prophet of science fiction's final descent into paranoia and madness. For all of this though, it wasn't until I picked up one of Lethem's first published novels, Amnesia Moon, that I was able to see just how much the hallucinatory style of Dick had influenced the writer.
Living in an abandoned movie theater in Wyoming, drinking poorly distilled grain alcohol and forcing himself to stay awake for days at a time to stop himself from dreaming, Chaos can't really be said to be enjoying his apocalypse. At some time in the past something happened that shattered the world. Nuclear war, alien invasion, a blinding mist- theories abound. Too bad nobody can quite remember their names, let alone their past, so we're not quite sure. What we are sure about is that in the wake of this disaster a group of people arose who were able to make their dreams into reality, influencing those around them to believe, look like and act according to this inflicted reality. Tired of dreaming other people's dreams, Chaos flees Wyoming with a fur-covered girl in search of the answers to his past and the source of the all-pervading amnesia. The duo take a roadtrip through the blasted ruins of America, alternately being effected by and effecting the various dreamers that they come across.
With its ever-shifting cascade of conflicting realities, its obsession with the frangible nature of identity and its bleak view of the future, this book could easily have been published as a recently discovered manuscript of Dick's. The swirl of events passes through so many different scenes, each town an isolated universe of disorder and insanity, that I was reminded of the complete head trip of Dick's Ubik and The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, never sure what to believe or where the truth may lie. In recent years Lethem has shifted his sights from the science fiction of his early books to his other lifelong obsession (music) but he still stands as an accomplished master of the genre. If all you've read of Lethem is his post-millennial output then you owe it to yourself to try out his first books.
Living in an abandoned movie theater in Wyoming, drinking poorly distilled grain alcohol and forcing himself to stay awake for days at a time to stop himself from dreaming, Chaos can't really be said to be enjoying his apocalypse. At some time in the past something happened that shattered the world. Nuclear war, alien invasion, a blinding mist- theories abound. Too bad nobody can quite remember their names, let alone their past, so we're not quite sure. What we are sure about is that in the wake of this disaster a group of people arose who were able to make their dreams into reality, influencing those around them to believe, look like and act according to this inflicted reality. Tired of dreaming other people's dreams, Chaos flees Wyoming with a fur-covered girl in search of the answers to his past and the source of the all-pervading amnesia. The duo take a roadtrip through the blasted ruins of America, alternately being effected by and effecting the various dreamers that they come across.
With its ever-shifting cascade of conflicting realities, its obsession with the frangible nature of identity and its bleak view of the future, this book could easily have been published as a recently discovered manuscript of Dick's. The swirl of events passes through so many different scenes, each town an isolated universe of disorder and insanity, that I was reminded of the complete head trip of Dick's Ubik and The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, never sure what to believe or where the truth may lie. In recent years Lethem has shifted his sights from the science fiction of his early books to his other lifelong obsession (music) but he still stands as an accomplished master of the genre. If all you've read of Lethem is his post-millennial output then you owe it to yourself to try out his first books.
June 29, 2015
Mad Moon: Furry Road
I've read a bunch of Lethem (and a lot of Philip K Dick), so for me this novel was just a mediocre, road trip, post-apocalpytic PKD remake*. IT had obvious direct PKD references and influences: Eye in the Sky & Dr. Bloodmoney & The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch. PKD is the only one who should really try to be PKD**.
Later Lethem (Motherless Brooklyn & The Fortress of Solitude) & Chronic City) is more confident and sings with his own voice. This one apes and apes well at times, but leaves a lot of soul out of the narrative. Still, I can't demolish 'Amnesia Moon' too hard despite the sometimes wispy narrative and repetitive set pieces because I see the latent talent in Lethem and just want more of HIS voice, more of HIS taint and HIS talent.
* And to be fair to Lethem, there are plenty of mediocre PKD novels out there too.
** Although I do appreciate how Lethem's love for PKD being is felt in his editing of The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick and The Philip K. Dick Collection.
I've read a bunch of Lethem (and a lot of Philip K Dick), so for me this novel was just a mediocre, road trip, post-apocalpytic PKD remake*. IT had obvious direct PKD references and influences: Eye in the Sky & Dr. Bloodmoney & The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch. PKD is the only one who should really try to be PKD**.
Later Lethem (Motherless Brooklyn & The Fortress of Solitude) & Chronic City) is more confident and sings with his own voice. This one apes and apes well at times, but leaves a lot of soul out of the narrative. Still, I can't demolish 'Amnesia Moon' too hard despite the sometimes wispy narrative and repetitive set pieces because I see the latent talent in Lethem and just want more of HIS voice, more of HIS taint and HIS talent.
* And to be fair to Lethem, there are plenty of mediocre PKD novels out there too.
** Although I do appreciate how Lethem's love for PKD being is felt in his editing of The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick and The Philip K. Dick Collection.
February 7, 2017
I seem to have a knack for picking up the odd ones lately. This particular one is weird in my favorite kind of wacky weird way.
I've been trying to think of how to explain this one without giving away the why of things, which is really the coolest part. I'm going to give it a shot.
Chaos is living in Hatfork, Wyoming where the world is ruled by a man named Kellogg's dreams. After yet another unpleasant encounter, Chaos takes to the road with his furry companion, who is actually a 13 year old girl. In Hatfork they believe that there was a nuclear disaster and it's caused genetic mutations. As Chaos travels west he encounters a series of what are sort of like pocket dystopias. Each one thinks something different happened to end the world, and each one is very unique. I'm hard pressed to say which one was the most bizarre. There's The Green, Vacaville, San Francisco, and L.A. that I can remember.
I think it's a rare author that can pull you into a bizarre situation and have you completely riveted. I didn't realize how hooked I was until a phone call interrupted the conversation between a clock and a bonsai and I couldn't get off the phone fast enough. "The bonsai was in the middle of saying something!!!"
This was really interesting and I got drawn in more and more as the story progressed.
I've been trying to think of how to explain this one without giving away the why of things, which is really the coolest part. I'm going to give it a shot.
Chaos is living in Hatfork, Wyoming where the world is ruled by a man named Kellogg's dreams. After yet another unpleasant encounter, Chaos takes to the road with his furry companion, who is actually a 13 year old girl. In Hatfork they believe that there was a nuclear disaster and it's caused genetic mutations. As Chaos travels west he encounters a series of what are sort of like pocket dystopias. Each one thinks something different happened to end the world, and each one is very unique. I'm hard pressed to say which one was the most bizarre. There's The Green, Vacaville, San Francisco, and L.A. that I can remember.
I think it's a rare author that can pull you into a bizarre situation and have you completely riveted. I didn't realize how hooked I was until a phone call interrupted the conversation between a clock and a bonsai and I couldn't get off the phone fast enough. "The bonsai was in the middle of saying something!!!"
This was really interesting and I got drawn in more and more as the story progressed.
December 16, 2021
Surreal, dreamy little banger evoking the early works of Ballard.
August 16, 2024
I don’t write reviews.
This story reminded me of Terry Bisson. There’s a similar post-apocalyptic feeling, though Bisson is a bit more charmingly eccentric. I also felt some Mick Farren, yet if pressed, I couldn’t say why. I also couldn’t find any humour in this tale. “Wryly funny” is not an accurate description in the least.
This story reminded me of Terry Bisson. There’s a similar post-apocalyptic feeling, though Bisson is a bit more charmingly eccentric. I also felt some Mick Farren, yet if pressed, I couldn’t say why. I also couldn’t find any humour in this tale. “Wryly funny” is not an accurate description in the least.
April 19, 2018
Video review
For fans of Ubik-style Dick, quirky sci-fi in the same vein as Aldiss' Hothouse, and generally speaking of mutant novels that can shift shape in the span of two pages. Also, the least post-apocalyptic post-apocalyptic novel you will ever read.
For fans of Ubik-style Dick, quirky sci-fi in the same vein as Aldiss' Hothouse, and generally speaking of mutant novels that can shift shape in the span of two pages. Also, the least post-apocalyptic post-apocalyptic novel you will ever read.
September 26, 2013
Since I just re-read 'Motherless Brooklyn' I thought I'd get around to reading the sci-fi book of Lethem's that's been sitting on my shelf. Unfortunately, I didn't like it nearly so much.
'Amnesia Moon' is really a seriously wanna-be-Philip-K.-Dick book. If you really like Dick and his trippy perspectives on things, you might love this book. I thought it had some interesting moments - but, as a whole, it didn't work for me.
It's a post-apocalyptic scenario. There's definitely been some kind of disaster, but no one seems to remember exactly what happened. No one really seems to remember much. Everett Moon, aka Chaos, etc, leaves the derelict town he believes he's been in for the last five years, along with a mutant teen, and embarks on a journey... it seems that everything has become very "localized" - different areas are completely different realities, possibly controlled by those individuals whose dreams have gained the power to influence reality. Moon seems to be searching for something - but it's hard to identify what you want when you can't even remember your old loves or friends...
Like I said, there were some interesting scenes - the "green" town is memorable, and the idea of accessing and communicating with people by injecting drugs was kinda interesting (if, again, Dick-ian). However, the book has no conclusion whatsoever, let alone an explanation. I felt like the author couldn't think of a satisfying way to explain what had happened - so he just decided not to bother with an ending at all. Disappointing.
'Amnesia Moon' is really a seriously wanna-be-Philip-K.-Dick book. If you really like Dick and his trippy perspectives on things, you might love this book. I thought it had some interesting moments - but, as a whole, it didn't work for me.
It's a post-apocalyptic scenario. There's definitely been some kind of disaster, but no one seems to remember exactly what happened. No one really seems to remember much. Everett Moon, aka Chaos, etc, leaves the derelict town he believes he's been in for the last five years, along with a mutant teen, and embarks on a journey... it seems that everything has become very "localized" - different areas are completely different realities, possibly controlled by those individuals whose dreams have gained the power to influence reality. Moon seems to be searching for something - but it's hard to identify what you want when you can't even remember your old loves or friends...
Like I said, there were some interesting scenes - the "green" town is memorable, and the idea of accessing and communicating with people by injecting drugs was kinda interesting (if, again, Dick-ian). However, the book has no conclusion whatsoever, let alone an explanation. I felt like the author couldn't think of a satisfying way to explain what had happened - so he just decided not to bother with an ending at all. Disappointing.
August 29, 2007
This is a wild and wacky novel with fun plot twists and interesting characters that probably fits into the post-modern magic realism genre.
July 25, 2015
This makes Dostoyevski's The Double look like child's play. And the notion of FSR--Finite Subjective Reality makes Inception's Dream Seeding like something commonplace, accessible.
The Chaos/Everett interplay is the most entertaining cabal of schizophrenia I've ever encountered. Jonathan Lethem, without a doubt is a genius, Amnesia Moon is both comic and tragic, funny and heartwarming. And sometimes grotesque too. But so much fun to read. Or listen to, I listened to to the audio book narrated by Scott Sowers. And, yes, a lot of the books enjoyment can be attributed to the narrative prowess of Scott. But this book can hold its own in text form too.
I first discovered Jonathan Lethem through his short story King of Sentences that appeared in The Best American Short Stories 2008. And I've been hooked ever since.
Can't wait to start MOTHERLESS BROOKLYN.
The Chaos/Everett interplay is the most entertaining cabal of schizophrenia I've ever encountered. Jonathan Lethem, without a doubt is a genius, Amnesia Moon is both comic and tragic, funny and heartwarming. And sometimes grotesque too. But so much fun to read. Or listen to, I listened to to the audio book narrated by Scott Sowers. And, yes, a lot of the books enjoyment can be attributed to the narrative prowess of Scott. But this book can hold its own in text form too.
I first discovered Jonathan Lethem through his short story King of Sentences that appeared in The Best American Short Stories 2008. And I've been hooked ever since.
Can't wait to start MOTHERLESS BROOKLYN.
June 25, 2015
Loved it! What a zany dream-world! Where do dreams and reality collide? How can one tell in which state one is in? What if one's dreams collide with another's dreams? Can one stop dreaming to live reality? What's reality?
This book is surreal, which makes it incredibly interesting and entertaining. Chaos moves from one dream state to another, trying to figure things out. The world has changed. Where did he come from? How can he find out? Who can he believe? What's real? As he struggles to make sense of things the dream-like world changes and changes.
I really enjoyed the wacky surrealism of this story. I'm glad I picked this book up. It's the first of Jonathan Lethem's books I've read but I'll be reading more.
This book is surreal, which makes it incredibly interesting and entertaining. Chaos moves from one dream state to another, trying to figure things out. The world has changed. Where did he come from? How can he find out? Who can he believe? What's real? As he struggles to make sense of things the dream-like world changes and changes.
I really enjoyed the wacky surrealism of this story. I'm glad I picked this book up. It's the first of Jonathan Lethem's books I've read but I'll be reading more.
October 16, 2020
Il "Chaos" è il protagonista assoluto di questo romanzo di Lethem.
Un protagonista che tramite i sogni è in grado di modificare i mondi e le vite di chi lo circonda (oltre che della sua...) senza averne però pieno controllo.
Un romanzo che ti tiene incollato alle sue pagine, anche se oggettivamente non sono sicuro di aver capito perfettamente tutto ....
Come scritto da altri prende parecchio spunto da Dick, specialmente da Ubik.
Un protagonista che tramite i sogni è in grado di modificare i mondi e le vite di chi lo circonda (oltre che della sua...) senza averne però pieno controllo.
Un romanzo che ti tiene incollato alle sue pagine, anche se oggettivamente non sono sicuro di aver capito perfettamente tutto ....
Come scritto da altri prende parecchio spunto da Dick, specialmente da Ubik.
March 25, 2009
Easily my favorite of Lethem's Dick-influenced "Concept Sci-Fi" beginnings, Amnesia Moon is part post-apocalyptic pulp, part episodic road novel, part Wizard of Oz reworking, and part surrealist philosophizing. It's pretty heavy on the familiar or cliche plot devices -- village of mutants, amnesiac protagonist, authoritarian local government, alien conspiracies, the subjective nature of the world -- but thrown together with fresh vision and panache into a truly unique work. Takes some truly unexpected turns and renders some really gripping scenes that resemble little before or since.
Writing this review finally, a year and a half after reading this one, I'm bumping it up a star and seriously wanting to read it again.
Writing this review finally, a year and a half after reading this one, I'm bumping it up a star and seriously wanting to read it again.
December 14, 2013
Be wary of this book. Be aware that for about two thirds of it it will make next to no sense. Be aware that the final chapter, the one in which answers are given, when the plot is made tidy, when we get to breath deep and finally "get" what's going on--that chapter is missing.
Chaos lives in a future America after the bombs have dropped, living among mutants in an abandoned theater, afraid to sleep because then he will be forced to dream the dreams of the petty tyrant who rules this land. When he escapes, he finds another world, not one of bombs, but of a green mist that covers everything, rendering the population blind, the dreams of that town controlled by some other petty tyrant. There are dreams of a barely affected San Fancisco, McDonald's workers who never leave the building, a Nevada overrun by aliens with humans fighting from fortresses in the sky that never land, of a whole range.
Chaos must try to understand these dreams, he must try to remember his past (no one can), he must try to understand this world. He won't, but he must try. This is a novel about trying to understand the world, our society and our wishes. It is sometimes rough, but the language is beautiful, the imagery is stark and the questions, lacking any simple answer, are probing and many.
Sometimes I wonder how Lethem even got this (and his followup, As She Climbs Across the Table, about a woman who falls in love with a scientific nothing called Lack) published, but I'm sure as hell glad he did.
Chaos lives in a future America after the bombs have dropped, living among mutants in an abandoned theater, afraid to sleep because then he will be forced to dream the dreams of the petty tyrant who rules this land. When he escapes, he finds another world, not one of bombs, but of a green mist that covers everything, rendering the population blind, the dreams of that town controlled by some other petty tyrant. There are dreams of a barely affected San Fancisco, McDonald's workers who never leave the building, a Nevada overrun by aliens with humans fighting from fortresses in the sky that never land, of a whole range.
Chaos must try to understand these dreams, he must try to remember his past (no one can), he must try to understand this world. He won't, but he must try. This is a novel about trying to understand the world, our society and our wishes. It is sometimes rough, but the language is beautiful, the imagery is stark and the questions, lacking any simple answer, are probing and many.
Sometimes I wonder how Lethem even got this (and his followup, As She Climbs Across the Table, about a woman who falls in love with a scientific nothing called Lack) published, but I'm sure as hell glad he did.
July 3, 2011
Jonathan Lethem did it to me again! I am not a great fan of science fiction but I enjoyed "Amnesia Moon" just as I enjoyed "Motherless Brooklyn" and yet do not read many murder mysteries. Here is one gem from the book, "Vance being real doesn't mean the aliens are, said Fault. It's just another dream, Everett. What better way to keep people under your thumb? Make up some big enemy, justify everything as part of the war effort." This is a story about a lost, single man named Chaos who discovers the meaning and importance of family, they are the people who take care of you every day and reward you with love.
April 24, 2016
As typical of most "literary Science Fiction" it is only interested in using the SF/Fantasy genre for a hip, ironic setting, however, it seems that Lethem lacks the talent to pull it off effectively. I forced myself to finish this book with a vague interest to find out "what happens", only to have the payoff of a lame, unsatisfying ending.
January 13, 2011
Each chapter we learn more about Chaos' world yet each chapter we know less. Amnesia Moon is a trippy dystopian novel that follows around Chaos, a movie theater dwelling survivor, in his trek to find what is wrong with the world, and what is wrong with his memories. Lethem effectively throws us into a weird place with memories that can't quite be counted on and situations that take a few paragraphs to start making sense. The characters are all well defined (when appropriate) and I was always interested in what was going to happen next, but I was a little bit less than satisfied with the book. (Perhaps, my expectations were set too high based on the excellence of Motherless Brooklyn and Gun, with Occasional Music two of Lethem's other novels that I found to be excellent. ) I wouldn't tell someone not to read it. But, I cannot imagine reading it again. In thinking about how I can enjoy characters and be interested in what is happening and still not love the book - I enjoyed the individual chapters, but the book in it's entirety didn't gel together to create a great story.
September 18, 2024
What a fucking trip. Might need to go back and re-read the ending again because 🤯
May 8, 2013
First of all, I love being dropped into the middle of a story and having to figure out what's going on--seriously. Secondly, Lethem's got an easy-to-read style that just flows well and gets the pages turning right away. So, knowing all that, why only three stars?
Unfortunately, my interest started waning toward the end. I'm not sure if the book actually became less interesting, or if it was a matter of lost momentum for me: I had a busy weekend where I was hardly able to get any reading in, and when I came back to the book on Monday, I just didn't have as much motivation to keep going.
Also, there's the issue with the ending. As people have said all over Goodreads, it's ambiguous, and that's actually another one of the things I often like in books: trying to figure out just what happened in the final pages. It makes me think, and that's a good thing. And even if I can't come up with an answer to all the questions on my own, at least I can poke around the Internet and read some theories, which is always fun.
But alas, between losing interest in the second half of the book, fighting to stay awake while I read those last few chapters (boy, was I tired), and the intentional ambiguity of Lethem's story, I wasn't left with a very satisfying taste in my mouth.
One thing that I greatly regret (after reading some of the other Goodreads reviews) is not having read some more Philip K. Dick before tackling Amnesia Moon. Apparently there are lots of references to PKD stories in here, but all of them went right over my head. Sad.
Then again, maybe this is a good thing--it might get me to seek out some more Dick, which is something I should have been doing anyway. Hurrah!
Unfortunately, my interest started waning toward the end. I'm not sure if the book actually became less interesting, or if it was a matter of lost momentum for me: I had a busy weekend where I was hardly able to get any reading in, and when I came back to the book on Monday, I just didn't have as much motivation to keep going.
Also, there's the issue with the ending. As people have said all over Goodreads, it's ambiguous, and that's actually another one of the things I often like in books: trying to figure out just what happened in the final pages. It makes me think, and that's a good thing. And even if I can't come up with an answer to all the questions on my own, at least I can poke around the Internet and read some theories, which is always fun.
But alas, between losing interest in the second half of the book, fighting to stay awake while I read those last few chapters (boy, was I tired), and the intentional ambiguity of Lethem's story, I wasn't left with a very satisfying taste in my mouth.
One thing that I greatly regret (after reading some of the other Goodreads reviews) is not having read some more Philip K. Dick before tackling Amnesia Moon. Apparently there are lots of references to PKD stories in here, but all of them went right over my head. Sad.
Then again, maybe this is a good thing--it might get me to seek out some more Dick, which is something I should have been doing anyway. Hurrah!
March 19, 2013
I'm glad I read Chronic City and The Fortress of Solitude before this, because I wouldn't have tried Lethem again had this been my first experience.
April 15, 2021
3.5
This book is so weird, creative, and feverish that it should be four stars, but the ending bumped it down to 3.5 stars.
This book is so weird, creative, and feverish that it should be four stars, but the ending bumped it down to 3.5 stars.
August 30, 2024
“What we observe is not nature itself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning.”
- Heisenberg
"The world is the totality of facts, not of things."
- Wittgenstein
Post-apocalyptic? Not quite. Dystopian? From a certain perspective, yes. Surrealist? Inarguably.
As Lethem demonstrates with Amnesia Moon, quite literally everything is all about the angles. He offers neither armageddon nor the slow-descent into the end times Last-Days-of-Rome style but instead presents twin synchronized realities-- pockets of apocalypse happening congruently. The book opens on the familiar images of sun-blasted ruins of Wyoming that evokes Mad Max but quickly veers into dozens of adjacent frames that all stake their claim on the One True Reality. I'll try not to give the game away but even the blurb will tell you that you'll pass through dystopian suburbs, Silicon Valley, Eternal McDonaldland, and several others. Pluck a character from any one of these environments and they'll all come to very different conclusions about how life is, how it ought to be, and what are its immutable qualities.
Philip K Dick is alive and well in the stories of Jonathan Lethem, and Amnesia Moon is a worthy entry into this miniature canon of surrealist science fiction. Yet I consider Amnesia Moon to be far more approachable surrealist literature as opposed to giants of the genre like Kafka, Carrington, Barthelme, Borges, or even Dick himself because of Lethem's unwavering commitment to establish a "sane" perspective despite the massive shifts in perspective the book threads together. I love Kafka and Barthelme, but I often feel like the authors create insane characters who are obtuse, maybe even a little too poetic in their narration as to make them untrustworthy or at least difficult to follow. Just as no person believes themselves to be the villain in their own story-- nobody views their own reality as particularly strange in Amnesia Moon (as is natural). In fact, if they view their world as suffering from societal collapse, it usually takes the form of an oppressive mundanity and a tyranny of same-old-same-old. It's the reader who is treated to an interdimensional odyssey without even leaving the Central Time Zone, even if the characters struggle to hold onto what's real.
Put another way-- people usually only mention handholding when it comes to difficult, atypical literature when a story *doesn't* hold your hand. I would say that Amnesia Moon is a complex, satisfying, strange novel that *does* hold the reader's hand in a way that doesn't involve spelling things out or being too on the nose (part of the reason this comparatively short novel took me so long to read was that a great many passages are laced with double meanings its best to mull over). Perhaps that means it doesn't reach the surrealist heights of some of the greats, but it gains a bit more in coherency (which is in fact NOT the antithesis of surrealist literature).
It is hard not to see the parallels between Chaos, the amnesia-suffering protagonist, his home inside a decrepit movie theater, and Plato's Allegory of the Cave. The rules of society are revealed to be arbitrary, the frame is constantly subject to manipulation and misunderstanding. It's nudged and posed both by nefarious plotters, existential forces, and even conventional logistics like a zip codes-- all of which Lethem reveals to have shocking implications for what makes up the true world "out there". In many ways it is our great neverending search: that chase for a firm grip on existence, purpose, and physics that we can eventually build a society on top of knowing it is logical and objective. But be warned: you'll be waiting your whole life.
It is mind-blowing that Lethem wrote this pre-9/11. Unfathomable given some of the places it goes.
- Heisenberg
"The world is the totality of facts, not of things."
- Wittgenstein
Post-apocalyptic? Not quite. Dystopian? From a certain perspective, yes. Surrealist? Inarguably.
As Lethem demonstrates with Amnesia Moon, quite literally everything is all about the angles. He offers neither armageddon nor the slow-descent into the end times Last-Days-of-Rome style but instead presents twin synchronized realities-- pockets of apocalypse happening congruently. The book opens on the familiar images of sun-blasted ruins of Wyoming that evokes Mad Max but quickly veers into dozens of adjacent frames that all stake their claim on the One True Reality. I'll try not to give the game away but even the blurb will tell you that you'll pass through dystopian suburbs, Silicon Valley, Eternal McDonaldland, and several others. Pluck a character from any one of these environments and they'll all come to very different conclusions about how life is, how it ought to be, and what are its immutable qualities.
Philip K Dick is alive and well in the stories of Jonathan Lethem, and Amnesia Moon is a worthy entry into this miniature canon of surrealist science fiction. Yet I consider Amnesia Moon to be far more approachable surrealist literature as opposed to giants of the genre like Kafka, Carrington, Barthelme, Borges, or even Dick himself because of Lethem's unwavering commitment to establish a "sane" perspective despite the massive shifts in perspective the book threads together. I love Kafka and Barthelme, but I often feel like the authors create insane characters who are obtuse, maybe even a little too poetic in their narration as to make them untrustworthy or at least difficult to follow. Just as no person believes themselves to be the villain in their own story-- nobody views their own reality as particularly strange in Amnesia Moon (as is natural). In fact, if they view their world as suffering from societal collapse, it usually takes the form of an oppressive mundanity and a tyranny of same-old-same-old. It's the reader who is treated to an interdimensional odyssey without even leaving the Central Time Zone, even if the characters struggle to hold onto what's real.
Put another way-- people usually only mention handholding when it comes to difficult, atypical literature when a story *doesn't* hold your hand. I would say that Amnesia Moon is a complex, satisfying, strange novel that *does* hold the reader's hand in a way that doesn't involve spelling things out or being too on the nose (part of the reason this comparatively short novel took me so long to read was that a great many passages are laced with double meanings its best to mull over). Perhaps that means it doesn't reach the surrealist heights of some of the greats, but it gains a bit more in coherency (which is in fact NOT the antithesis of surrealist literature).
It is hard not to see the parallels between Chaos, the amnesia-suffering protagonist, his home inside a decrepit movie theater, and Plato's Allegory of the Cave. The rules of society are revealed to be arbitrary, the frame is constantly subject to manipulation and misunderstanding. It's nudged and posed both by nefarious plotters, existential forces, and even conventional logistics like a zip codes-- all of which Lethem reveals to have shocking implications for what makes up the true world "out there". In many ways it is our great neverending search: that chase for a firm grip on existence, purpose, and physics that we can eventually build a society on top of knowing it is logical and objective. But be warned: you'll be waiting your whole life.
It is mind-blowing that Lethem wrote this pre-9/11. Unfathomable given some of the places it goes.
December 28, 2023
Some things right out of the gate: this is not a book for most readers. The readers who read novels that are the standard traditional linear form of the novel, orthodox in every way like a high school English class would learn, will not want to read this. I have seen this book referred to as psychedelic, as avant-, as post-, etc. Sometimes some readers definitely want to read this style of book. At other times, I can see this being the last thing a reader wants to look at. Either way, I would be very surprised if the traditional reader would be very pleased with this novel.
The first quarter of this novel is very edgy, raw, even disgusting at times. It is not easy reading, especially because it is confusing and feels random. But once Chaos is on the road, the reader expects that the author has a destination, a mission and a goal, for his characters. This is a major interpretation of this novel: another American Road Novel. I tend to avoid this subgenre, because it does not resonate with me at all.
My main thought reading this is that this is a book that will forever get overinterpreted.
Overall, this novel is too light. It feels like there are a lot of cool segments, interesting sub-stories, interconnected but separate dreams, rhizomatic instances – but not enough to really ground anything so that the whole thing rather floats away… drifts away….
The first quarter of this novel is very edgy, raw, even disgusting at times. It is not easy reading, especially because it is confusing and feels random. But once Chaos is on the road, the reader expects that the author has a destination, a mission and a goal, for his characters. This is a major interpretation of this novel: another American Road Novel. I tend to avoid this subgenre, because it does not resonate with me at all.
My main thought reading this is that this is a book that will forever get overinterpreted.
Overall, this novel is too light. It feels like there are a lot of cool segments, interesting sub-stories, interconnected but separate dreams, rhizomatic instances – but not enough to really ground anything so that the whole thing rather floats away… drifts away….
December 27, 2019
Interesting take on the post-Apocalypse/mind-bending reality genre, where reality becomes literally subjective. Sometimes it gets a little too obtuse, but there’s some really good moments and ideas. Letham’s got a weird imagination, as seen in another book of his I read awhile back, Gun, With Occasional Music. Possibly not for everyone, but if you like PK Dick, you might try this.
December 30, 2018
I... think? there's some interesting metaphors buried in here, but it's mostly incoherent. If you like David Lynch at his worst, then you might dig this.
November 21, 2019
Aw man! I can really see why some people hate this novel or find it too confusing and unstructured, but this is my jam. Amnesia moon's final chapters had me reading at 3am with 4 hours to go until I got up for work.
It's fun, confusing, absurdly trippy, and now, a personal favourite of mine.
It's fun, confusing, absurdly trippy, and now, a personal favourite of mine.
November 22, 2010
I've noticed Lethem's similarities to Philip K. Dick before, but it's extremely apparent here, almost to the point where this could be a lost novel by PKD. This is a trippy story that bends reality to extreme lengths, and one is never sure exactly what is real and what is a dream (that makes it sound like Inception, which maybe isn't a terrible comparison). I can't say that it completely makes sense (although it's not necessarily supposed to; more on that at the end), but I really enjoyed every word.
It starts out very Fallout-esque, with a cool post-apocalyptic vibe and characters with names like Chaos and Edge. At some point in recent history, there was a "break" in reality - possibly a nuclear war, or a plague, or an alien invasion. No one seems to know exactly what happened or when. As our hero Chaos (or is it Moon, or Everett?) moves west, he encounters different dream-states, each stranger than the last. Different parts of the country seem to be under the influence of "dreamers" who can influence reality around them.
The ending, like the rest of the book, is ambiguous. There seems to be a hint of an answer, but in a book about the subjective nature of reality, an absolute explanation would contradict everything that came before. If I had to guess at what the "break" really was, I think the alien invasion angle fits the best. Chaos sees the helicopter-planes twice in different locations, which might mean that they are real and not the creation of a dreamer. The alien "hive-mind" is analogous to the dreamers, and it would also explain why everyone seems to have amnesia. Ultimately though, it doesn't matter. The question of the "break" becomes a metaphysical one that doesn't need to be answered, and each person lives within their own bubble of reality. I don't think it's a coincidence that our "hero" is named Chaos - he moves from reality to reality disrupting the order of the dreamers, with the results sometimes positive and sometimes negative.
Highly recommend to fans of intelligent, reality-bending sci-fi and/or Philip K. Dick.
It starts out very Fallout-esque, with a cool post-apocalyptic vibe and characters with names like Chaos and Edge. At some point in recent history, there was a "break" in reality - possibly a nuclear war, or a plague, or an alien invasion. No one seems to know exactly what happened or when. As our hero Chaos (or is it Moon, or Everett?) moves west, he encounters different dream-states, each stranger than the last. Different parts of the country seem to be under the influence of "dreamers" who can influence reality around them.
The ending, like the rest of the book, is ambiguous. There seems to be a hint of an answer, but in a book about the subjective nature of reality, an absolute explanation would contradict everything that came before. If I had to guess at what the "break" really was, I think the alien invasion angle fits the best. Chaos sees the helicopter-planes twice in different locations, which might mean that they are real and not the creation of a dreamer. The alien "hive-mind" is analogous to the dreamers, and it would also explain why everyone seems to have amnesia. Ultimately though, it doesn't matter. The question of the "break" becomes a metaphysical one that doesn't need to be answered, and each person lives within their own bubble of reality. I don't think it's a coincidence that our "hero" is named Chaos - he moves from reality to reality disrupting the order of the dreamers, with the results sometimes positive and sometimes negative.
Highly recommend to fans of intelligent, reality-bending sci-fi and/or Philip K. Dick.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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September 11, 2016Lethem’s previous Sci-Fi novel “Gun with Occasional Music” is one of my all-time favorites, so when I saw this new science fiction novel by Lethem I snatched it up. After reading it, I can’t say I have a new, all-time favorite, but the novel is well-written, with strange and interesting characters and settings.
Like “Gun with Occasional Music,” the new novel explores themes of remembering and forgetting. In the dystopian future Lethem creates for “Amnesia Moon,” certain people, none of whom are particularly nice or deserving, can, through a kind of telepathy, vanquish the past, create new realities, and force other people to live in them. The results range from sad to horrific, but, the reader soon begins to realize, aren’t all that different from the way things work now.
Lethem writes beautifully (“dang I wish I could write like that” beautifully.) A line like this: “He reached out and poked Chaos with the suck end of the cigar, leaving a smear of tobacco-brown drool on his tee shirt.” can make a whole scene work—and Lethem has scenes full of them.
If it were me, I might have left some of that beautiful stuff on the cutting room floor. This novel saunters, so if you’re looking for a thrill-ride—well, “Amnesia Moon” is more of a train trip from Chernobyl to Fukushima than a rocket ship to the moon (it’s a train that turns into a submarine and then back into a train, okay?) If you do read it and like it, you will probably also like “Gun with Occasional Music,” which moves at a faster clip.
Reminds me of: “The Dreaming Child,” one of my favorite short stories, by Isak Dinesen
Like “Gun with Occasional Music,” the new novel explores themes of remembering and forgetting. In the dystopian future Lethem creates for “Amnesia Moon,” certain people, none of whom are particularly nice or deserving, can, through a kind of telepathy, vanquish the past, create new realities, and force other people to live in them. The results range from sad to horrific, but, the reader soon begins to realize, aren’t all that different from the way things work now.
Lethem writes beautifully (“dang I wish I could write like that” beautifully.) A line like this: “He reached out and poked Chaos with the suck end of the cigar, leaving a smear of tobacco-brown drool on his tee shirt.” can make a whole scene work—and Lethem has scenes full of them.
If it were me, I might have left some of that beautiful stuff on the cutting room floor. This novel saunters, so if you’re looking for a thrill-ride—well, “Amnesia Moon” is more of a train trip from Chernobyl to Fukushima than a rocket ship to the moon (it’s a train that turns into a submarine and then back into a train, okay?) If you do read it and like it, you will probably also like “Gun with Occasional Music,” which moves at a faster clip.
Reminds me of: “The Dreaming Child,” one of my favorite short stories, by Isak Dinesen
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