Cain's Book

This is better than Naked Lunch or Junkie or possibly even Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. I think Alexander Trocchi was one of the most underrated writers of the 20th century. It's too bad that he never wrote another novel, and died basically unknown. The Grove edition is the best one. Don't bother with the One World Classics version, because the typeset is ugly and small and the paper quality sucks. This edition is the superior one.

It was one of the definative founders of the Beat Generation who defined the term as: "Someone who can upon arrival score dope on a streetcorner in any foreign city without knowing the language in a relatively short amount of time", such was the exemplar: Alexander Trocchi, a bonafide "Cosmonaut of the interior" who has remained underground amongst the public altho Cain's Book is a veritable Book of Genesis in the unrepentant world of the proponents of heroin (the-hero-in-side-of-us-all)...I believe the book can only be fully fathomed by one of its own, and that any attempt at critical analysis (in any concentrated area besides linguistics and historical antecedents) will fall flat on its face from an overdose of misinterpretation as cultural relativity here relies upon narcotic initiation & adepthood. "INVIOABLE" is the greatest interpretation of narcotica ever devised with Trocchi as its herald. To laymen no doubt it would seem a glorification, not unjustified but perhaps dangerous, yet Trocchi shows us his heart as well as his arms; His sincerity is the measure of his success as much as his prose is imbued with all the charisma of a literary outlaw making the book a garden of eden for lovers of highly-stylized literature to prance through uninhibited by serpents and blood-apples. The book cannot be compared with W.S. Burrough's "Junky" which in his words is straightforward hard-boiled detective journalism not aimed at literary greatness; "Interzone" is the closest comparable work if your looking for such a summation, but Trocchi here exceeds WSB in everyway, not that there was ever any competition involved in Cain's Book's history, except in its ability to slay all that would be "Able" to match it in scope of intensity and truth. Literary references abound, Kafka's "Burrow" being a most memorable analogy for drug addiction's isolation. The book blends a disturbing surrealism with at preferable times stark naked realism. More than a literary picnic it's a veritable "naked feast" for those hungry for underworldly experience at a somewhat hypocritical safe distance; but no blame exists in such a world as Trocchi's, where pain is noblely accepted and suffering's accordingly annihilated by the supremacy of narcotics; a most merciful God so long as its followers remain loyally and necessarily criminally devoted to obtaining their metamorphic substenance; and likewise the strictest satanus if they fail to do so, in a way, worship this slave-God... Famous among the famous, a "writer's writer", Beat generation legend, composer of metaphysical pornography, a hero amongst the Situationalists, a universal phenonemon with "wanted" posters slung all across Europas and Americas, Alex Trocchi's Cain's Book will be the one book he will be remembered for, even though his "Insurrection of a Million Minds" is a landmark collection of autobiographical social philosophy, his "Yound Adam" an acknowledged erotic classic, and his cosmic sex-thrillers from Olymp

As a matter of serious concern regards this rare jewel in the lotus THIS BOOK BEARS NO COMPARISON WITH W.S.BURROUGH"S "JUNKY" which in WSB's words is merely an attempt at hard-boiled detective work by an addict; not (!) a serious literary work aiming at anything besides getting down on paper the quite dull exoteric truth about what is perhaps the hardest job in a world of unmanagable professional addictions being that narcotic hell of withdrawal and the constant 24 hour a day big business of NARCOTICS, best summed up as "the high-cost of low-life living" WSB was lucky enough to be able to partially support his ape-size habit via an inheritance...ALL of WSB's other works(besides "Queer") ruthlessly explore and expose the world run rampant by CONTROL, with NARCOTIC ADDICTION as metaphor for all planetary existence...which is more along the tracks of Cosmonaut ALEXANDER TROCCHI intentions (and success), who I predict will one day like WSB become a more public legend, which his miraculous and exemplary life and works are worthy of...his metaphysical pornographic erotica is the stuff of such legends already (see White Thighs, Young Adam, Thongs) the blood of which is rushing to the center of literary underground stardom making hard the various body parts of so many seekers after the darker side of beat exploration...'The Beat Generation" was once summed up by themselves as "The ability of standing on a streetcorner in any foriegn city in the world and being able to score in a relatively short amount of time"...Alex Trocchi was such a man and it is in this sense along with the people he knew that he bears relation to beat objectives (the objectives of critics, not the worldwide artisians themselves) Trocchi was a world phenonemon, carousing the globe always artistic and ever active...he is a supreme example of one whose life WAS their art, and if there is any blame laid against him for being a junky for the greater part of his existence then I merely refer those people to the couple hundred thousand or so heroin addicts of the terrestial globe and ask them to account for what art they have produced to match in quality (not quantity) what Trocchi has done with just Cain's Book alone (with "ABLE" beaten to a pulp fiction novel decaying in some distant outhouse being put to use in its ultimate function) I've re-read the novel several times and found myself under its influence, literally tasting the cyanide-like flavor explode in my mouth as when he describes how junkies love to watch others get high by the almost nauseous wave when the eyes slit and the jaw drops to the floor and they say "hit" (given of course they have theirs marked out by two little x's already positioned in pupils the size of a matchtips)...the books descriptions of heroin's gripping obsessive way of life in no way sum up this masterpiece of novel narcotica literature; rare feats of prose are planted like explosives all over the text and the sense of people and place is overwhelming i

The sporadic bursts of description are luscious, but what hits me is his lucid analysis of America's growth-stunted approach to drugs and addicts. A truth teller.

I came across this book through a friend, just looking for some quick fiction to read. And it was a quick read- but also one of the best books i have ever read. But don't think of this as Junky II. You will probably be disappointed. Not because it isn't as good, It may even be better, but Trocchi's style is completely different than Burroughs'. I felt Junky was missing something when i read it, like a part of me was unsatisfied even though the rest of me totally dug the book. After reading Cain's Book i realized what it was. Burroughs tells you the straight dope on heroin (pun intended,) in a straight style- but Trocchi absolutely glorifies it, justifies it, and turns being a heroin addict into an act of poetry. His meticulous attention to detail and description combined with an unbelievable talent for contorting the english language into prose so distorted yet completely enthralling, turns heroin from an object, as i felt it was depicted in Junky, into a character.. The book turns out to be a complete document of what it is to feel alienated. Not to mention that Trocchi also writes some of the best sex i have ever had. If you have ever hated the world, or yourself, you need to read this book.

Written 40 years ago in New York's Greenwich Village, the incandescent, internationalist Scotsman Trocchi takes the reader on a visceral ride much like Burrough's "Junkie." A Beat classic.