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Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas
  
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Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas (Audio Cassette)

by Tom Robbins (Author)
3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (64 customer reviews)

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Product Description

From Publishers Weekly

Robbins (Skinny Legs and All; Even Cowgirls Get the Blues) begins this disappointing novel just before Easter weekend, as commodities broker Gwen Mati-half-Filipina, half-Irish-is in her favorite Seattle bar, mourning the stock market's nosedive. A devout materialist, Gwen is concerned that an honest-to-goodness crash might expose some of her less-than-ethical maneuvers. By the time the market opens again on Monday, however, her life will be altered in ways she can't imagine. Among those promoting the changes are an obese spiritualist named "Q-Jo," a pizzazzy character who exits too soon from the story; Larry Diamond, Robbins's requisite mystery man on a bike; and Andre, Europe's most notorious simian jewel thief. Devotees of the serious should avoid Robbins-this volume, for instance, contains discussions about extraterrestrials who take the form of amphibious humanoids and about the effect of eating asparagus on a person's urine. All of this is, for Robbins anyway, fairly safe territory-a quirky female protagonist undergoing life changes at the last minute-but something goes wrong here. The biggest problem may be Gwen herself: an unpleasant character, she's greedy, manipulative and without a trace of remorse. Though Robbins, who narrates to Gwen in the second person, can still put together clever turns-of-phrase ("Tim-buk-tu. One of the phonetic wonders of the world"; "haughty as an unpaired chopstick"), he seems unable to distinguish details and characters worth hanging a plot on from those best discarded.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Robbins offers a wild and wacky trip featuring, among other things, a stock market crash and various philosophies about meaning and the origins of cultures. Gwen, an endangered stockbroker, is involved with strait-laced Belford and his born-again monkey. When she is attracted to Larry-who has cancer and is currently between trips to Timbuktu-she must choose among the American dream, the Timbuktu alternate, and something else. The book is a whirlwind of mad incidents, semiprofound observations, and an endless supply of great lines. The author of Skinny Legs and All (LJ 3/1/90) has come up with a very funny book that might incite a bit of thinking as well as laughter.
--Robert H. Donahugh, formerly with Youngstown & Mahoning Cty. P.L., Ohio
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas
69% buy the item featured on this page:
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Customer Reviews

64 Reviews
5 star:
 (26)
4 star:
 (15)
3 star:
 (8)
2 star:
 (8)
1 star:
 (7)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.7 out of 5 stars (64 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars Wuf! So long, and thanks for all the frogs, May 26 2007
By Amanda Richards "Modest to the extreme" (Georgetown, Guyana) - See all my reviews
(TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas (Paperback)
This book is classic Tom Robbins in the sense that almost every page has some hilariously humorous play on words, or unreal observation about real events, including a lot of incisive commentary on the subject of Washington's allegedly wooden teeth. (I kept wondering if he got knot holes instead of cavities, and whether he used Terminix for dental services*)

That said, this is not one of his best books by a long shot. It starts slowly, works up to a purple passion and then lands flat on its squatty Buddha-esque rear end. The tortuous tale twists around a feckless female Filipino stock broker, facing the fall of the fickle stock market over the Good Friday weekend, frantically forming far-fetched formulae to foil her forthcoming firing. Her acquaintances include a traditionally built psychic, whose fall-back occupation is watching home movies of the lonely and attention-deficient, a philanthropic Lutheran real estate broker who desperately wants to marry her, and last of all, a born again Barbary ape with a yen for banana popsicles and larceny.

While living through the worst days of her lives, she meets a tattooed ex-broker recently back from Timbuktu, and tracks him to his den of decadence beneath a bowling alley. Through this earth shaking incident, not all of which could be blamed on the rise and fall of the bowling pins, she has an Alice in Wonderland experience involving a distant planet, a toothy Japanese doctor who is said to have found a cure for cancer, an inscrutable Indian and a whole lot of amphibians.

Highly pseudo-philosophic, with unlikeable characters and flimsy plot, the main thing this has going for it is the dry humor of the word play, and all the rain in Seattle can't wash that away.


Amanda Richards


*Not a Tom Robbins quote, but it might have been if I didn't write it first
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2.0 out of 5 stars A Sleepwalk, Mar 12 2007
By K. S. Puls (British Columbia, Canada) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas (Paperback)
Reading this novel is like watching a superstar in any genre having a disastrous turn. You've been inspired and elevated by his genius, and now you see him abusing his remarkable gifts with a tawdry performance. Robbins is the Icon of Imagery, the Master of Metaphor, the Tsar of Simile, a magician,a philosopher, John Fowles on peyote, Will Durant tripping... but not in this novel. If you enjoyed seeing Kwan skate in one too many Olympics, Mohammed Ali fight six too many fights,or the Bee Gees make one record, you might not mind this disappointing effort. If you're a Robbins fan (and if not, why not?),though, this is a rotten ostrich egg of a novel.
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1.0 out of 5 stars Robbins' worst, July 1 2004
By Zeeshan Hasan (Dhaka, Bangladesh) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas (Paperback)
I'm sorry, but I'm a big Tom Robbins fan and this book was just terrible. After all the hilarious religious commentary in his other books, it just seemed silly.
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 		 Most recent customer reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Simply Great
I don't know that I have a lot to say. I read this before reading any of the (obviously) very divided reviews here and I felt that I needed to add my own two cents. Read more
Published on May 29 2004 by smithnae

2.0 out of 5 stars An OK Book.... a bad Tom Robbins book.
You have seen some of the other reviews of this novel and you have read and even identified with the responses of the most passionate of the reviewers. Read more
Published on Mar 11 2004

5.0 out of 5 stars thought provoking
of the four novel by tom robbins I've read, this is the most thought-provoking. what robbins does best is show the world from the view points of people -- and things -- you'd... Read more
Published on Mar 10 2004 by rick bramhall

1.0 out of 5 stars everyones got a hard luck story
I am wrapped in unfathomable disappointment, having just finished Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas. I don't know whether this is simply the worst novel Tom Robbins has written, or... Read more
Published on Nov 29 2003 by S. Rhodes

5.0 out of 5 stars don't compair, just read
If you like all of the other books by T.R. and you like them to the point of idolizing him you will not like this book. Read more
Published on Nov 6 2003 by G Smith

3.0 out of 5 stars half asleep...
This is the fourth Tom Robbins book I've read, and even though I enjoyed it, _Half Asleep In Frog Pajamas_ is my least favorite so far (the best being _Still LIfe With... Read more
Published on Sep 16 2003 by Elizabeth Roberts-Zibbel

4.0 out of 5 stars Tom Robbins--the Master of Metaphor
... I do believe that Tom Robbins' work is like strawberry ice cream; either you like it or you don't. Read more
Published on July 21 2003 by Amy Davis

1.0 out of 5 stars Stuck
I have read all seven of Robbins' other novels, and loved them all, in varying degrees. In fact, I've re-read most of them multiple times! Read more
Published on Jun 10 2003 by ALB

1.0 out of 5 stars What a disappointment!
I am an avid Tom Robbins fan..but this book was the one stinker in the bunch. The main character was so obnoxious person, I had no sympathy for her. Read more
Published on May 5 2003 by Christina Robertson

2.0 out of 5 stars It's not even cream, it's dream whip, gone stale and dry.
Tom Robbins' formula wears a little thin after 30 years or so. He's still the master of the surprising irreverent metaphor, but the flashy froth that was new and fun in the 60s... Read more
Published on Mar 20 2003 by Sanson Corrasco

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