Rating: 
Summary: The Ultimate Yummy Cotton Candy Sugar Rush for Your Brain
Review: "The Ultimate Rush" is a novel for the MTV/Sugar Addicted/AOL Junkie Gen X'ers of the encroaching new millenium -- and it totally rocks. As long as you go in knowing what to expect (this ain't exactly Steinbeck), a fast paced, highly profane, far fetched, violent novel set on wheels you're going to have a great time. With the occassional lapse into too-technical computer talk, and a few plot holes big enough to throw a skateboard through the book isnt all perfect. BUT the characters are too funny for words, the chase scenes are toe curling, and I was even inspired to dust off my rollerblades and head back out to the street. Anyroad, it's definitely fluff reading, but highly enjoyable fluff with a wicked sense of humour.
Rating: 
Summary: Bravo!
Review: After buying this book on a Friday night, I was amazed to find it was late Sunday night as I surfaced from the finished book. What an awesome read. I'm truly chomping at the bit for more of Joe Quirk's works of utter amazement.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't Believe the Hype
Review: Believe it or not, I am NOT trying to be facetious when I write: If you can get past the gut wrenchingly cliched characters, the excruciatingly cheesy dialogue, and the completely implausible, comic-book-like action scenes, you might just enjoy this book. I bought and read it because I was looking for something light and fun after hacking my way through DeLillo's *Underworld.* However, I suffered reader's whiplash as I went from the hyper-literary to the complete ridiculousness of *The Ultimate Rush.* I'm 29, and I certainly don't profess to be any kind of expert on punkers, skaters, or bladers, but I'll be damned if ANYBODY talks like this. Mr. Quirk earns points for his raw enthusiasm for writing and I'll admit the "Gratutitious F***" chapter had me, shall we say, briefly riveted, but otherwise I cannot believe literary standards in this country have fallen so low that this work could be taken seriously. If you know someone who is young, bored, and doesn't read a lot, this book may be a good way to lure them into the act. That's the best I can say for this piece of overindulgent hackwork ... dude.
Rating:
Summary: Five Stars is the only rating to give this book.
Review: Definitely check this one out. Quirk displays his talent like a peacock; his prose struts and announces itself with breezy aplomb. But just when you think his rapturous skater-punk sexual narrative is getting to wild a freakish, he will suddenly slow things down in a stunning rendering of a tender or beautiful moment. Ho Pixie, to me, is already a classic female character that I will never forget, and she's all the more impressive since she was created by a male. Ultimate Rush reminds me of Clockwork Orange in the technical sense that the author manages to get his observations about class and society across to us through an empty glass-- that is a first-person slangy narrator who is not necessarily aware of what we, the readers, see in what he is telling us. That aspect alone is interesting, and the sheer forward momentum of this action-adventure makes it great fun. Women beware: this is a boy's book-- sensitive and poetic, yes, but a boy's book nonetheless. Book lovers should get it just for it's sheer originality and uncategorizableness. On that lame attempt at Quirkspeak, I sign off.
Rating:
Summary: hyperactive writing style
Review: Definitely the most explosive action scenes I have ever read. And it just keeps going! Who is this talent? Where did he come from? When will he write another book? This book screams to be a movie.
Rating:
Summary: This is a damn good read!
Review: For a first novel, this is a revelation. It is fast paced, original and funny. There isn't a paragraph in this whole book that you have read before. It is the story of a Gen-exer who is a messenger in San Francisco and who gets caught up in some nefarious goings on between his boss and some other lesser lights and how he extracates himself from same. Putting his friends in jeopardy as well as himself, he decides to stop a money making scheme between some scummy lawyers and drug suppliers. It is fast and funny and never makes the rookie mistake of taking itself too seriously. This is one good read.
Rating:
Summary: The Average Joe's Ultimate Rush
Review: Haha...first lemme point out, I find my review title funny. Wow, I crack myself up. Anyhoo...this book, The Ultimate Rush, my friend Alicia and I read it and wow, did it give us something to gawk at or what. I'm still passing it around my circle of friends as well, who would all comment well on it. We find ourselves now using clever lines flourished from the author Joe Quirk's head, and refer to it even as the "Bible" on some occasions, considering we follow up on it for quirky lines and thanks to Ho, fashion statements. Not only has this book opened my eyes to more comedic and real-time thoughts, thanks to sarcastic lead character Chet Griffen, a hacker turned ex hacker turned blader boy hacker with some serious issues when it comes down to love life, making rent, and choosing television channels with his roommate and disabled buddy Denny. Not ONLY do things get worse when his lesbian friend Ho breaks up with her girl, and Chet realizes that he's got the hots for her, but also when this simple messenger guy becomes the hunted by the hunter, which not surprisingly turns out to be the Chinese mafia! I dunno about you, but this is simply one paragraph, and already I'm feeling the need to re-read the book for the hundredth time. Anyway, pick up the book...I got it for cheap because the boneheads that call themselves book critics can't tell the difference between shat and THE SHAT (I'll make it past tense so my review will be read), so spare a few bucks and give this excellent bundle of paper and ink a try, and trust me: You'll soon be left feeling the average Joe's ultimate rush.Haha...I did it again. Go me. And go READERS and pick up the book already!
Rating:
Summary: Multi-levelled, stylish, great fun, fast read.
Review: I agree with the reader from Kentucky. Quirk writes this book at literary as well as commercial levels. It's all there in the first scene. Everybody loves it for how fast-moving it is, but try reading it more slowly!! Chet moveds through birth, death, heaven, hell. He becomes a fetus, he "get's air", "snatches a little piece of eternity", becomes "free from guilt and shame" then returns to mortality. Everything about Chet's quest is the same search of the heros from the Western canon. Yet what is amazing about all this is The Ultimate Rush's accessibility. Most novels that juggle these themes are obese and self-congratulating-- Pynchon leaps instantly to mind. Quirk spans the gap between commercial appeal and literary depth with amazing grace. With all the in-your-face assertiveness of his skater protagonist, the author himself hides his structure of symbols behind Chet's braggadocio with humility, almost shyly. Read it carefully. There is a powerful mind at work behind this fast-moving story.
Rating:
Summary: I couldn't put the book down.
Review: I finished this book in two days it was so good. Definately a fast paced, action packed cyberthriller for the 90's. I loved the mention of recent events and 90's music and tv programs. Chet's narrow escapes amaze me. An excellent first book for Joe Quirk. I can't wait until his next book is published.
Rating:
Summary: "I emit the appropriate squeel of glee."
Review: I hate to chime in with everybody else, but let's face it, this is a brilliant book. Quirk hefts those ten pound images around like shot put. Where most writers strain to get off one heavy line, Quirk tosses them around like a juggler. Not only could I not put it down, I was laughing out loud every page, so my sister kept asking me wht I was laughing at alone on the porch. I forgot that reading is supposed to be fun. Read the whole thing in 2 days, and will read it a second time. A total joy ride, plus it made me think. The real question for me is: Why would a writer of this obvious prowess write a standard action-adventure story? Is Quirk saying that to get his literary themes across to us, he must hide his artistry beneath a tasty sugar coating of Rambo-like fantasies?
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