horrendous narration good story ruined

good premise for a story but the author writes like a 1st year creative writing student..way too much answering of rhetorical questions.. " can I ask you a question??" " yes, ask me a question "
narrator is horrible. no inflection at all. sounds like a computer reading the story.

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Interesting and strange

I enjoyed the book, and I think it touches on some interesting themes such as the danger of good intentions, the culture of death, and the crisis of faith. It is my second Walker Percy book, the first bring The Moviegoer, which I liked a little better. The other thing I like about these books is the Louisiana seeing that is described in such detail.

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Interesting story, monotone narration?

The story is interesting, it’s my first encounter with Walker Percy, so maybe I am just missing something. I’m afraid I found Mr. Hiller’s narrative style off- putting. I found the native bigotry of the characters offensive, but that’s the point, I guess.

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Interesting but not my favorite.

While it was a bit wandering and seemed dis-connected from 'Love in Ruins' this was still a most enjoyable book. I would say it wanders like our present age and the author expresses well the manner in which the Church has also been adrift and left so many of Her children in a like state.

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Unusual But Satisfying

The narrator speaks with a cadence that is unusual to my ear. I do not know if this is a typical speech pattern in the part of Louisiana where the story takes place, or the narrator’s personal interpretation. I eventually became accustomed to it.
The story itself is very good, and I highly recommend it.

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An odd book

I would recommend this book to someone who likes the deep South at the customs and the way you’re talking and saying things without talking.
It is slow speaking and lots of pauses.
The main character is a psychiatrist and he acts that way throughout the book.
It was interesting when he discovered odd things about his community but how he went about resolving it was not to my liking.
I will try other books by this author.

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1 person found this helpful

Social commentary novel

Summary: Dr. Thomas More has recently been released from two years of prison for selling prescription drugs and returns to his Louisiana community to discover that all is not right.

The Thanatos Syndrome is sort of a sequel to Love in the Ruins, but apart from the characters, much has changed. Thomas More is still a somewhat neurotic psychiatrist. He has ‘found himself’ after two years in jail and is no longer drinking to the extent that he was. He is now married to his former nurse/secretary/love interest from Love in the Ruins. But the world is very different. Love in the Ruins was in a sort of post-apocalyptic world where there was no real national government and many extremist groups that had created their own little fiefdoms. But Thanatos Syndrome is set in a late 1980s Louisiana (it was written about 15 years after Love in the Ruins) that is not too different from the real 1980s Louisiana.

Thomas More had one real significant research achievement the Lapseometer. In Love in the Ruins, it was designed to read the state of the soul with the ability to fix mental imbalances. In Thanatos Syndrome, it is a brain scanner that detects heavy salts in the brain that impact brain function. Soon after being released from prison, he is asked to consult with several patients. Most of these are people he has previously worked with and knows in this small community. They are changed. Over time Thomas More realizes that something is impacting a large area making people more docile, more computer-like in their ability to access information, and the women are more sexually aggressive. There is a crazy old catholic priest who was a boy during the early days of Nazi Germany that speaks up if the social commentary was not clear enough.

Walker Percy is writing a social commentary novel. The main theme of the book is social engineering. A group of rogue scientists and doctors are using the water system to nearly eliminate crime, teenage pregnancy, and other social ills, but also removing part of what it means to be human. Thomas More thinks that the human part is really important. Percy (and More) are Catholic and there is an underlying catholic social teaching that opposes abortion and euthanasia and eugenics as well as an obligation to care for AIDS patients and other ‘undesirables’. He critiques racism and sexism while illustrating it, so there are problems with me recommending it.

I really like Thomas More as a character. He is a soul doctor and even if curmudgeonly, he is likable. He embraces a number of his weaknesses and does not try to hide his struggles. One of the controversial parts of the book (spoiler) is that one of the doctors that are behind this unethical experiment is using the experiment to create a school for the purposes of child sexual exploitation. And other doctors are aware of his subproject, but they ignore it “for the greater good.” Many of the general comments about the book objected to it because they didn’t see how that fit into the broader story. It is my assumption that Percy picked the sexual abuse of children as something that could pretty universally be condemned to show that social engineers tend to engineer society not for the common good, but for their own benefit. Like the last book, sex is more desired and talked about abstractly than it is illustrated in the pages. But this is not a book for kids.

Kids would not read it regardless because it is fairly slow and oriented around the ideas and social commentary more than the plot. I primarily listened to this as an audiobook with some occasional kindle reading. (The audiobook was part of the Audible free library, but it is leaving on Feb 22, which is what prompted me to pick it up.) The narration is good, but it is not a top-tier read. I am glad I read it, but I am still mixed on Walker Percy. My favorite of his books has been The Second Coming. Love in the Ruins and Thanatos Syndrome were odd by I am glad I read them. I have started The Moviegoer and The Last Gentleman and gave up on both of them.

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1 person found this helpful

Reading better for this one

I stopped listening with 4 hours 55 minutes remaining. Listening is delightful with good narration, but this is like listening to a computer voice; it simply fails to convey emotion.

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In the end one must chose--given the chance.

"It is not for me to say whether one should try to be happy -- although it always struck me as an odd pursuit, like trying to be blue-eyed--"
--Walker Percy, The Thanatos Syndrome.

Probably 3.5 stars. Not my favorite Walker Percy, and definitely not the one to start with. It starts with dark humor and absurdism and twists into a creepy weird horror show and slowly wades the reader back out.

I get what Percy was doing here. I really do. I get the metaphor, but ye gads, it wasn't exactly a joyride. There were parts I absolutely adored. So, if you have never read Percy, kick this one down your list. If, however, you have already read The Moviegoer, Love in the Ruins, The Second Coming, sure, yeah, knock your self out. Just look out. It is like eating a 7 Pot Primo pepper. Sucker is going to burn, kick, and sting.

Ultimately, Percy gives away his big point with a flashback from the crazy priest sitting in the watchtower. The mad priest and Dr. Tom More discuss modernism, psychology, and the rise of the Nazi bureaucracy in the early 20th century. The point I think Walker is trying to convey in most of his books is the Modern World, with its technologies, drugs, philosophies, etc., has kind of left us unprotected. Some of those things that seem, from a utilitarian view, to improve our lives will probably end up deadening our existence. The one institution that might be able to warn us, protect us, provide some level of comfort and security after we have been stripped bare by Modernism -- the Church -- is starved, weakened and almost unable to give us the basic rituals and nourishment we need to combat the technocrats, bureaucracies, and wicked forces that latch onto Modernism (I don't think Percy is arguing that Modernism itself is evil, simply that it efficiently plows the ground for evil seeds). Anyway, this is Percy's BIG THEME and he just hits it really hard, over and over, in this book.

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17 people found this helpful

Somewhat dated plot

Would you recommend this book to a friend? Why or why not?

Not in this form. The reader has obviously never set foot in Louisiana or he would have been able to pronounce Ponchartrain (as in the lake), Tunica and (for God's sake ) New Orleans. His faux southern accent set my teeth on edge and ruined this Walker Percy novel.

What other book might you compare The Thanatos Syndrome to and why?

This book reminded me of several books I have read which focus on environmental tampering by persons wanting to "better" humanity.

Would you be willing to try another one of David Hilder’s performances?

Never, never, never! Note to Mr. Hilder- only in bad movies or on television do people say
"Nawlins" for New Orleans. People from Louisiana doe not say this-ever!!!!

Was The Thanatos Syndrome worth the listening time?

I love Wlaker Percy but will go back to reading rather than listening to his books. Actually this book would have been very good with a reader like Will Patton or Dick Hill.

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3 people found this helpful