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Title: Starts off brilliant; turns horrible midway
Review: Did Joseph Heller proofread his own stuff? There are so many useless -- and misused -- parentheticals in this novel that it is hard to stay focused. One minute you're starting a sentence, Heller goes off on a 15 sentence sidethought that has nothing to do with the sentence he started writing, and then 3 minutes later you're back in the middle of the sentence he started... but you have to go back and see just how that sentence began! It's completely absurd. And frustrating. I was beginning to scream obscenities out loud.The first part of the book is brilliant. Funny. Refreshing, really. I thought I was about to read the best thing I've read since... well, Catch-22. But halfway through the chapter on the unhappy daughter the novel becomes tiringly tedious. A task. When was reading supposed to feel like such a job?I couldn't finish it. Others who actually have gotten through it say nothing happens anyway! (And it took him 13 years to write this?)
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