I think I'm a bit confused here...I'm not sure what you're asking for, Liz. Our thoughts on the book or how it has affected us?

Shallow, conventional, literal me!!! Wish I'd had a chance this month to go back and look for deeper meanings in this book and join in the great discussions! When I read the book, I was so busy laughing my head off at the preposterousa situations that I really didn't go beyond that. Though I'm quite familiar with the time period and events covered, I am clueless about the drug situation in those years (think I lucked out by moving from LA!!) so I had a lot of trouble trying to relate to that, but thoroughly enjoyed living vicariously through the freakiest drug situations imaginable. So the main effect of the book on me was to amuse me, introduce me to a writer whose every work I want to read, and give me a taste of the drug culture. Recently got the 'Breakfast with Hunter' dvd and find the guy 'in person' absolutely charming, brave and maddening. So FALILV also led me to 'meet' Johnny's fascinating friend. I'm glad I've had the chance to enter this new world.

UM.. I am not sure I can pinpoint something, or say that it has changed my life. But I found the book HILLARIOUS and entertaining from the first word to the last. The deeper meanings in the book I don't think I would have understood aswell without these disscussions but I think they did affect me in a way. It made me glad that there were other people out there that cared about what happens to people, that fight for change. Whether HST achieved any change as such I am not sure, but at least he wrote a book that could inspire others to do so.

this discussion was great because it came at a time that we were all saying goodbye to Hunter. I understand him more with everything I read of his. I like being apart of his world.

Like everyone else, I found the book hilarious. I laughed out loud at something on nearly every page. But on a deeper level, I found it very sad. The Wave speech just makes me want to cry. I get such a sense of loss from the book.

I think this book will mean different things to me at different times in my life.

When I read it initially, I saw it as something funny, witty, and entertaining and a great intro into Hunter's writing, which made me want to read more.

Then I read it again in connection with seeing the movie and saw it as something that meant a lot to a great many people, especially Johnny and that made me view it from his perspective and wonder what he saw in it.

Now, I've read it again after Hunter's death and I see it in more nostalgic terms, with some sadness mixed in with the humor and poignancy. Of course the ONBC discussion added so much more to it this time too.

Who knows where I'll be in my life when I read it again. I never thought I'd be here discussing it with so many wonderful, funny, outrageous people. Maybe next time I'll be reading it in a Paris cafe, sipping wine, when a certain someone walks by, notices the book and stops to chat......*sigh*

What time does our plane leave KY?

Don't forget me *runs after plane*

Any time you say DITHOTgonzo!! But if we are to go now, we better head south to the Bahamas where he is filming to make sure we can 'accidently' bump into him, books in hand!

Quote:

What does F&LILV mean to you personally?

Apparently, reading this book has unleashed some kind of hideous, reptilian beast from deep within my soul....





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. . .as long as you don't start gnawing on somebody's neck, you're okay, CarrieKY!

Thanks, CarrieKY, for just making me laugh out loud.

And it's hard for me to really say what F&LILV means to me personally. I've carried this book around with me for more years than I haven't. It's moved with me over 20 times. Gone to school and work, concerts, lived in my car, my guitar case and my nightstand. It's one of the books that doesn't ever get packed in a box. I always take it with me in my bag to wherever I am going. I can say this: My life would have been very different without this book in it. I feel lucky to have discovered this book at such a young age and to have been able to read it as I got older. I've given away more copies to teenagers than any other book. Some of them take to it right away. Others come back years later to thank me.

This is the coolest thing, that each time I read it, I discover something new. And discussing the book with you guys has multiplied that many-fold. Yeah, that's the coolest thing.