"You know, it's economical not to have a storyline, cause then you can just film people saying things." ~ Crow T. Robot talking about the movie Werewolf on MST3K. I sure got that same vibe here.

Honestly, this is a three point fiver to me. But it's hard not to admire the pure batshit ambition that went into the creation of Tormance. Maskull goes on a sci-fi version of Dante's Divine Comedy or Pilgrim's Progress -- the alien world is populated by groups of oddly shaped humans each with super hard opinions about philosophy and genders, which they are more than happy to talk about [and then usually die for].

Lindsay's work is pretty revolutionary for gussying up a buckshot of philosophy as a science fiction/fantasy yarn. It's all fascinating to think about, but as a book, its fiery momentum putters out about halfway through, when it becomes clear that there will be no really satisfying answer to what the hell I've been reading (the ending is still pretty cool though).