Sorry for the absence of late, but this book was LONG. Worth it... but long. I must say that I found A Fraction of the Whole to be a little bit brilliant. I find it impossible to recount the plot, but essentially it's written from the perspective of Jasper Dean who tells you his whole crazy life story as written from jail, starting actually with the whole crazy life story of his father, Martin Dean - brother to the most infamous criminal in Australia. It jumps from Australia to Thailand to Paris and takes you in and out of jail, loiters amongst criminal bands, takes you on weird mystic type adventures, at one point the characters live in a labyrinth and ... I don't know... this book is hard to describe!I loved the book but am having a hard time thinking of who I would recommend it to. I'm not sure there are many that I know that would like it the way I did. It's wacky, absurd at times, and incredibly smart but if you don't have more than a touch of misanthropy in you, I don't think you'd enjoy it. There's quite a bit of adventure to the plot, but maybe even more philosophy - or maybe it's not really philosophy as much as weird, out-there thoughts about man, culture and other randomness. I laughed out loud frequently - the humor is dark and dry but that's one of my favorite breeds of funny.
