Rating: 
Summary: a method to the madness
Review: With the advent of Joseph Heller's first published manuscript to the nation's bookstore shelves in 1961, critical reviews were far from rave. Indeed, at first glance there seemes to be little reason why it should have been a success. The plot, what little there is, orbits freely of its own accord, and the chronology is so fragmented that it takes a ridiculous effort to piece snippets of time and space together. But it is the total absurdity and odd seriousness of Heller's bitter black humor that gave paranoid characters like Yoassarian and Major Major a cult following of average civilians and servicemen, if not the educated bigwigs.
To these perfunctory--and perhaps more cultured--readers, Catch-22 reads like one off-color joke after another. Logical fallacies abound. Why the pilot Orr puts crabapples in his cheeks, the reader will never know...except that they are better than horse-chestnuts. Why? Non sequitor. Milo buys eggs for seven cents on Malta and sells them to the mess hall...and still manages to make a profit using nothing but circular logic. It is this type of bizarre humor that propels the entire book. Heller's over-the-top slapstick and conflicting logic will seem like a literary papercut to some readers. Yawns, or even grimaces, may eventually paralyze most (normal) readers' hysterics about halfway through the mission to Bologna, but the pages keep turning.
There is a method to the rampant madness. Beneath its warped surface, Catch-22 addresses the depressing, scary, so-serious-its-sick subject of total war. Heller reaches a point where he is no longer funny because everything he writes suddenly springs true. For average non-entities like me, it rings a little too authentic.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't read this book unless you already have
Review: The only people who can really appreciate this book are ones who have already read it. So if you haven't read it, don't. But if you have, well then why bother?
Rating: 
Summary: A Book About Everyman
Review: At first I thought this book ridiculous. No one is as whacked as these characters. Then I started to recognize my own flaws. I saw that the ridiculous characters have the same flaws we all have, only exaggerated in the book. The Chief believes he will die of pneumonia so he does not bother to wear a coat. Of course he gets sick and dies of pneumonia. How many times have we lost before we started because we thought we could never win? We defeat ourselves as the Chief did. I saw myself in other characters too. Heller shows us our own tragic flaws through a cast of ridiculous, but quite realistic characters. Everyone should read this book. It is funny, sad, ridiculous and brilliant.
Rating:
Summary: Absolutely indispensible
Review: Catch-22 is one of those rare books that absolutely everyone should read; I reccommend it unceasingly to anyone and everyone. Though it is long, it is very readable, and you'll probably go through it quickly because it's so entertaining. Aside from its sheer fun and humor however, is the true message behind the book. It is often cited as being one of the great ant-war novels - and, indeed, it is just about flawless in this respect - but it goes much deeper than that. Catch-22 is really a book about paradoxes, and the sheer (necessary) insanity of modern life. The title itself is now a common - and oft-heard - refrain in the English language, and many might be unaware of its original source. The dictionary defines "Catch-22" as "a problematic situation for which the only solution is denied by a circumstance inherent in the problem or by a rule" - and that is exactly what the novel presents: situations showing the sheer necessary insanity of modern life. (War is one such - perhaps the most obvious - instance, but there are many others. This book offers satire on other subjects as well - i.e., federal aid for farmers.) And could life as we know it exist without this inherent madness? The question might be a lot more difficult to answer than you think. The premise of this book can also be summed up in a phrase from another great author, Fyodor Dostoevsky, "If everything on earth were rational, nothing would happen." That is what the book tries to say. It is not merely a simple anti-war book, despite what some shallow-headed readers and reviewers might say. I suggest that you read the book with an open mind: it's well worth it. The book is quite hilarous as well - the satire being very sharp-toothed. The book does not have a plot - indeed, it does not even attempt to tell a story, at least not in the usual sense. (Nearly) every chapter is named for a character in the book, and that chapter gradually portrays some of that particular character's crazy antics. Little bits of plot are glimpsed here and there, and then revealed gradually. The book is very non-linear and quite scattershot. It's similar to the way Kurt Vonnegut writes. I reccommend that everyone read this book. Quite aside from its near universal praise and the fact that an everyday word has sprung from it, it was in the Top 10 (#6, I believe) on New Modern Library's Top 100 Books of the 20th century. Put it on your reading list.
Rating:
Summary: Great book!
Review: This book is great! All the characters are insane! I'm almost halfway through and I still haven't found a plot! This book is hilarious, but it is sad and shows how crazy war really is.
Rating:
Summary: Like Drinking Champaign
Review: There are parts in this book that made me laugh out loud. And it made me think. Books don't normally affect me that way. So there is something special about this book. When I finished "Catch-22," I had to tell somebody about the book The urge to talk about it was strong. You always want to talk about grand realizations. Reading this book is one of life's grand realizations. There is no other novel like it in any other country. It is uniquely American. We all know the story. Yossarian's story. We all know about Snowdon. We all know about Milo Minderbinder. And about Major Major. What happens to them at the end of the book? They disappear. They all disappear. That realization made me sit up and take notice. When I was in Vietnam, my closest buddies went home before I did. They all went home at different times in those hot thirteen months. Until I was the only one left in Nam in my unit who remembered the past. Something like that happens in "Catch-22." Yossarian is the only one left at the end of the book. But he also disappears in the last sentence: "He took off." You are probably wondering where I am going with this. It is simply this: People you are close to today disappear tomorrow. Someone always moves, leaves the job, gets divorced, dies, and so on. You look around you and you wonder where did everybody go to? That was what I asked when I finished "Catch-22." "Catch-22" is a fast read. It will leave you full of excitement. It is like drinking champaign: it leaves you feeling very bubbly. I envy the person who is reading it for the very first time.
Rating:
Summary: A Very Funny Catch
Review: Catch-22, it has to be the funniest book I have ever read. The title itself, is a law in the army that has many parts. One of the parts is to get discharged from the army; you have to be crazy. To say you are crazy, you have to ask the doctor to keep you on the ground, but as soon as you say your crazy and want to be grounded, Catch-22 says you are sane to say your crazy so therefore you have to continue flying missions. The book is about a fleet of bombers that are bombing cities in Germany. They are constantly made to bomb, even when they are suppose to be sent home. The whole book is filled with crazy people, like Dunbar, he does things he hates doing, because it would make time go by slowly. Dunbar thought that it would make his life
longer. Orr, has to be one of the weirdest guys out there, like when he talks about putting crabapples in his cheeks when he was little or the prostitute that hit him with a shoe because Orr paid her to do so. The book is mostly composed of learning about characters and then their stories add on to a plot line indirectly. Throughout the book, it reveals more and more of the maincplot, escaping war. I recommend this book to everyone who has a sense of humor and enjoy books about war. I will read this book again, just because it was an all around good book.
Rating:
Summary: Ha Ha or He He?
Review: Catch-22, it has to be the funniest book I have ever read. The title it self, is a law in the army that has many parts. One of the parts is to get discharged from the army, you have to be crazy. To say you are crazy, you have to ask the the doctor to keep you on the ground, but as soon as you say your crazy and want to be grounded, Catch-22 says you have to be sane to say your crazy so therefore you have to continue. The book is about a fleet of bombers that are bombing cities in Germany. They are constantly made to bomb The whole book was filled with crazy people, like Dunbar, he would do things he hated doing, because it would make time go by slowley. Dunbar thought this would make his life longer. Orr, had to be one of the wierdest guys out there with his stories about putting crabapples in his cheeks or the protitude that hit him with a shoe. The book is mostly composed of learning about characters and then their stories add on to a plot line indirectly. Throughout the book, it reveals more and more of a plot, about escaping war. I recomend this book to everyone who has a sense of humor and enjoy books about war.
Rating:
Summary: clever story
Review: this is one hilarious story with some of the most memorable lines i have ever read in a book! great read!
Rating:
Summary: There's always a catch
Review: Usually I prefer shorter novels, ones in the 200-300 page range. However, at the recommendation of my friend, I decided to give Catch-22 and it's 450+ pages a chance. Looking back, I can't thank my friend enough for this recommendation. Catch-22 follows the people and events surrounding one Captain Yossarian, a World War II bombadier stationed off Italy. All he wants to do is live while, through his eyes, everyone wants to kill him. Even the people on his side are out to kill him. As the number of missions he must fly keeps rising, Yossarian keeps coming up with new ways to avoid his inevitable death. This book is littered with a cournicopia of interesting characters. Each one gets their own chapter (and in some cases, multiple chapters) and Joseph Heller manages to mesh them all together to form an interesting (albeit sometimes hard to follow) plot. At first it seems like the book isn't going to really go anywhere but before you know it, it's there. This book gave me a good chuckle on numerous occassions. Whether it was one of Yossarian's crazy schemes to get sent home or the officers' constant struggle to gain recognition (and promotion), there is never a dull moment.
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