Rating: 
Summary: Typing, not writing
Review: An inside look at lifestyles & literary machinations of early-- acredited "Beat" school luminaries,out West. Two-New--May-004 Bio on Jack Kerouac,by Paul Maher, & B.Kealing's.."Kerouac In Florida" plus Fall,004...D Brinkley's..Journals
Rating: 
Summary: Hip,..man..let's take it..ON The Road...
Review: An inside look at lifestyles & literary machinations of early-- acredited "Beat" school luminaries,out West. Two-New--May-004 Bio on Jack Kerouac,by Paul Maher, & B.Kealing's.."Kerouac In Florida" plus Fall,004...D Brinkley's..Journals
Rating:
Summary: Hip,..man..let's take it..ON The Road...
Review: An inside look at lifestyles & literary machinations of early-- acredited "Beat" school luminaries,out West. Two-New--May-004 Bio on Jack Kerouac,by Paul Maher, & B.Kealing's.."Kerouac In Florida" plus Fall,004...D Brinkley's..Journals
Rating: 
Summary: A jumbled description of life with the aging Beats.
Review: As the first poetry student at the Jack Kerouac School for Disembodied Poetics, Sam Kashner had an opportunity to write about some wonderfully unique experiences. Unfortunately, the book just isn't very well written.There were three main things that bothered me about the writing. 1) The chronology was inconsistent. I had a very hard time keeping track of when things were happening, and often in the space of a few pages the description of events was out of order.
2) There are quite a few obscure (for me at least) movie and literary references. Because I hadn't seen the movie or read the book, I couldn't relate to the reference.
3) The author had a tendency to go off on tangents in the middle of telling a specific story, and then resume the original story. It was hard to follow what was going on. One other issue I struggled with is how the author was able to remember very specific things that occurred almost 30 years ago. The book contains lengthy word-for-word conversations with the Beats, and I was often left wondering how the author could have remembered so much of these conversations. He didn't offer any clues as to how he remembered so much, which left me wondering how accurate it all is.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting but not necessarily accurate
Review: I have no way of knowing how much Sam Kashner remembers about what happened to him thirty yars ago. What I can say is that almost every statement he makes about music in this book is wrong:
*Jim Carroll's "People Who Died" isn't about his friends who died of heroin overdoses, it's about friends who died in a variety of ways.
*Graham Parker's record is called "Squeezing Out Sparks," not "Sparks Fly Upward." But Kashner couldn't have heard it when he says he did because it wasn't released until 1979.
*If we're to believe the chronology in the book, Kashner's girlfriend has a poster of Johnny Rotten in her house in 1976 and the Go-Gos came to Boulder in early 1977. The fact is, very few Americans would have known who Johnny Rotten was at the time, since the Sex Pistols didn't put out their first single in the U.K. until November of that year. And the Go-Gos, of course, hadn't even been formed yet.
*The band that Kashner remembers as Loud Fast Rules was surely the New York punk-pop band, the Stimulators, whose first single was a song called "Loud Fast Rules" and who were friendly with Ginsberg, but they didn't exist in 1977 either.
*Ginsberg played live and recorded with the Clash in the early 80s, but the band didn't tour America until 1979. And Ginsberg never appeared in a Clash video called "Combat Rock" (or any other Clash video) because that was the name of an album not a song. He did appear on a song on that album, however.
*Ginsberg did record a new wave-inspired single called "Birdbrain," but again it wasn't released until 1981. Yes, these are minor quibbles, but it only takes a few basic factual errors, which surely could have been checked by either the writer or his editor, to throw the accuracy of the whole book into doubt and to make the reader wonder how much of what Kashner says happened actually did.
Rating:
Summary: Not cool
Review: I set out to read this book because I am very interested in the school itself, which I still maintain, but I was sorely disappointed with the book itself. It should have been divided into two seperate stories, one about Kashner and one about the school--but how could he write a memoir and not include how "cool" he was--hanging out with the beats? I most certainly agree with Chris Jansen's list of problem's with this book. The obscure literary references were incredibly frustrating, it just led to me feeling alienated and uneducated. At one point Kashner refers to Ginsberg as a "jambon" for no reason but to, apparently, demonstrate his talent at remembering French words for food. Don't waste your money on this one, wait till your library gets it, or, if you're desperate to own it, until it comes to paperback.
Rating:
Summary: Beatniks in Hot Tubs
Review: I vote this FUNNIEST BOOK OF 2004. Besides Kashner thrilling us with his fly-on-the-wall memories of hanging with the Beats, it's also a window into that screwy, throw-all-the-rules-out era known as the 1970's. There's a deadpan, screamingly hilarious observation of the young and naive Sam Kashner, a Candide of the Rockies, on every single page. Beyond the laughs are incisive observations about our most famous Beatniks, their neuroses, their addictions, and the price they've paid for fame. It's the perfect book for anyone who was once a tortured high school poet who thought life could be perfect, if only they could hang out with real Beatniks. Buy this book!
Rating:
Summary: Beatniks in Hot Tubs
Review: I vote this FUNNIEST BOOK OF 2004. Besides Kashner thrilling us with his fly-on-the-wall memories of hanging with the Beats, it's also a window into that screwy, throw-all-the-rules-out era known as the 1970's. There's a deadpan, screamingly hilarious observation of the young and naive Sam Kashner, a Candide of the Rockies, on every single page. Beyond the laughs are incisive observations about our most famous Beatniks, their neuroses, their addictions, and the price they've paid for fame. It's the perfect book for anyone who was once a tortured high school poet who thought life could be perfect, if only they could hang out with real Beatniks. Buy this book!
Rating: 
Summary: Boulder was Cool once !
Review: Kashner writes with a humility that grows on the reader. The first half of the book was a sort of get acquainted period and the second half was frequently a gutbuster laugh. Of all the Beats he met Corso was his best pal. Ginsberg gets the wilting pansy label and Burroughs Sr comes off a lot more human and funny then most other portraits. The style of memory memoir is fine with mini chapter style. A fun read.
Rating: 
Summary: Sweet and Funny and not Howl
Review: Many of us enjoy the poetry and literary works of the Beats. Probably more admire the Beats for their willingness to take on the cultural establishment and conformist society of the Fifties. But, what were Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso, William Burroughs, and Peter Orlovsky like as people? This, Sam Kashner tells us in this gentle and humorous rendering of these Beats, which is set in 1976, when they were famous middle-aged (or older) men and on the faculty of The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics (don't ask) in Boulder, Colorado.
So, what exactly were these men like? For a quick answer, read the chapter in which Ginsberg, Burroughs, Corso, and Orlovsky take Billy Borroughs, the son, to the doctor. Anyone who has run a pointless errand with eccentric relatives will recognize the dynamic. They don't, by the way, get treatment for Billy but they respond to his wishes and leave him, feverish and alone, at a bar. Who says the Beats were self-absorbed?
I also give Kashner high marks for style, particularly for his skilled use of images from popular culture. These, especially his movie references, clarify and amuse, which is certainly Kashner's goal for this sweet and funny book.
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