For those of you that feel a need to put this in a slot, let us call this Gothic horror surrealism. Like all good surrealism the reader is going to want to assign meaning and connection to things that are meant to be meaningless and unconnected. On the other hand there is definitely somewhat of a linear plot here. In some places it is downright funny. The body snatching scenes are derivative of the usual cliches.

What else can you say about a book where the Divinity Student is eviserated and stuffed full of paper in the first few pages? Our fearless protagonist, a word-finder by trade, has to distill the essence of twelve dead word finders to finish the catalog of lost words. He will scamper through a surrealist background while he tries to finish his mission.

This is the only book I have read that has a large dose of surrealism and actually became a page turner for me. The Centipede Press hardcover is also beautiful and the illustrations are marvelous. I have not read anything except a few short stories by Cisco but I will definitely be dipping into this the rest of this box set from time to time. ( )

...