First off, if I could I would rate this book a ZERO. IT IS NOT WORTH YOUR TIME. This book has absolutely NOTHING to do with Buddhism or religion in general. Drugs and other intoxicants will NOT show you enlightenment. The only thing drugs will show you is what it's like to be on drugs. Real enlightenment comes from within. If you're serious about Zen, get a real book on it. Learn just what it was that Guatama Buddha taught. But if you're just looking for an excuse to do drugs, then by all means buy this book. Just don't make false claims that you're being spiritual. Own up to the fact that you have a drug problem.-end of review
Interesting anthology, probably worth putting together, very
little to do with 'Buddhism' per se, though it tries hard to make
some associations, they really aren't convincing.
The book leaves an empty taste and slight feeling of nausea after
reading of all the dopeheads parading off to Hawaii, the Amazon,
or Green Gulch, in search of a 'real teacher' who would validate
their drug desires. Trungpa's paradoxical positions on intoxication are described from a few viewpoints which make for interesting reading, and comparison with that of Suzuki Roshi's. If you like the vapid slickness of Tricycle's heavy paper and empty pages, you might like this book.
Otherwise, your time might be better spent cleaning the toilet or doing the laundry, while enduring the ongoing decline and fall of human civilisation, the horror, the horror.-end of review