Rating: 
Summary: Not very Enjoyable
Review: I did not really enjoy this book. Everyone raved about it, but I can't see why. I thought Ignatius Reilly was an annoying, unfunny jerk. I couldn't find anything amusing or interesting. I thought the attempt at humor was forced, obvious and rather pathetic. I could not finish the book because it was torture to read more than half of the book. I wish I could get a refund in all honesty. The prose was the only reason why I gave the book two stars.
Rating: 
Summary: A Don Quixote of the 20th Century
Review: Toole's book is quite simply the best written tragic comedy since Don Quiote. The reader is left not only laughing, but questioning what he is laughing at. Whether one is amused by the escapades of Ignatius Riley, or the absurdity of the society that Ignatius is force to live in, most will agree that Toole has created a literary masterpiece. The real tragedy is not Riley, or society, but the untimely death of Toole himself, which only leaves us to speculate how Ignatius's world view will collide with the madness of New York City.
Rating: 
Summary: A good laugh
Review: This is one of the greatest written "humorous" books I've ever read. I have that in quotes because it is also quite sad. I especially liked the interaction between Ignatious and his mother. I was a bit dissapointed in the ending though.
Rating:
Summary: The funniest book I've ever read
Review: I keep two copies of this book on a shelf in my home office, both wrapped in plastic. Why? Because every time I reached up to dust, I found myself picking up one of the two, which led to re-reading this gem of a comic novel. I've read it more than 10 times and I still guffaw every time. Ignatius and his New Orleans enemies (you'll see why he has no friends) are rich, hilarious characters. Toole had an amazing ear for dialogue and accents.
Rating:
Summary: Highly original, highly enjoyable.
Review: One of the most original and mind boggling novels I have read. It takes on a bit like, dare I say it, a Quentin tarantino movie in the way that it tells the story from several viewpoints that converge in the end. Enraptures you and once it has you in its grasp it never seems to let you go. It follows the tirades of Ignatius J Reilley, a failed intellectual, but a genius in his own right, who lives with his aging mother and a vast quantity of 'Dr Nut' Recommended for anyone who has the ability to read.
Rating:
Summary: Fantsastic
Review: There has never been, and will probably never be, a book as well-written and entertaining as this. This is easily one of the greatest books ever written. And I've read a lot. From the lowest dreck to the "finest" literature. And this one damn near beats them all.
Rating:
Summary: A skillful blend of humor laced with melancholy.
Review: This is one of the books that sticks in my mind, like Love in the Time of Cholera, because of its last lines: Innocuous on their own--you can skip to the end if you want and spoil nothing--yet they hit with a surprising force: the novel has a subtle momentum, steadily gained through the preceeding pages, that you only see in retrospect.
Rating:
Summary: Darkly comic indictment of modern society.
Review: Perhaps one of the funniest books I have ever read. While there have been a few negative reviews of the book, one has to fault the reader for that, not the writer. The real tragedy is that he is no longer around to favor us with more of his books. It is also a book one can recommend to almost anyone who has a brain.
Rating: 
Summary: Save Your Money and Time
Review: Like another John Kennedy (JFK), Toole has been immortalized for nothing more than dying young. Abusing one's widowed mother, eating everything in site, undermining one's employer just for kicks, yelling at strangers, threatening one's teachers, and dismissing blacks and homosexuals as manipulable minorities; are all not funny. If Toole had written a true farce, I could see the praise for this little book's little humor; but as it stands- with it's awful climax and resolution- this is nothing more than a waste of time and money.
Rating:
Summary: An indictment against the century...
Review: "...the complexity of my worldview, the decency and taste implicit in my carriage, the grace with which I function in the mire of today's world..." The dolts such as those immediately preceding this review cannot comprehend the profound wit that Toole utilizes to mold his main character Ignatius, and his story in general. It is my opinion that those who love this book do so on two levels: (1) no other "literary" novel exists with a funnier story and prose style, and (2) the book connects with many readers with high feelings of joy that is somehow ironically accompanied by comcomitant feelings of melancholy. I believe that the latter sentiments are due to the fact that most intelligent people find many things in this world, including society, to be baneful in nature due to common idiocy and mediocrity - and resultingly are cloistered within themselves, ever hopeful that there might be others out there who think and act like they do...Ignatius is a ! laughable idiot that can only be created as such from an intelligent, humorous, and unfortunately cynical individual such as Toole. In sum, I find comfort that this book is either hated or loved by those who read it - it would be an "insult to proper theology and geometry" if everyone loved Toole's story.
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