And Trail Mix Rained from the Sky: A Young Man's Ordeal With Coincidence and Miracles

By Philip Travisano

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0965799107
• ISBN13: 9780965799102
• Release Date: September 1997
• Publisher: Mammal Talk Books
• Length: 191 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.8" x 0.5" x 5.8"

Customer Reviews

Great read

This is an entertaining and thought provoking book. I got it for Xmas, started it on Boxing Day and finished it on Dec. 27th. I'd recommend it to anyone.

An Adventure of the Mind

Adam is a junior art director at a New York advertising agency. Restless, disillusioned with his work and with life in general, he is subjected to a series of apparently inexplicable happenings ranging from the trivial (popping lightbulbs) through the neutral (pretzel sticks falling out of a tin and landing in an organised pattern) to the downright bizarre (solidifying water, melting trash-cans). At first these seem like mere random coincidences, but gradually they begin to take on a more alarming aspect. In order to make sense of what's happening to him, Adam forms a theory based on the infinity of the universe, but as events overtake him it becomes clear that this rational explanation is not enough. And when the strange happenings (which are now verging on the miraculous) start to interfere with both his private and his working life, he quits his job and his home and takes off across America in search of answers. This is very much a novel of ideas. The ideas themselves are stimulating and ingenious; indeed the reader needs to bring a considerable amount of mental agility into play in order to follow them, but the effort is rewarding. The story is written in a vivid, colloquial style, the ideas being developed mostly in dialogue (like Plato's), a device that lends immediacy and makes the reader feel involved. For a first-time author, Philip Travisano writes with considerable skill, assurance and verve. He deftly employs the vital ingredients of good storytelling to carry the weight of his hero's theories and to make them accessible to his readers: the characters are engaging, the plot endlessly inventive, the pace relentless and the denouement unexpected, yet satisfying. In short, this is everything a good novel should be: it makes for a read that's both entertaining and thought-provoking. Self-published in 1997, the book itself is beautifully produced: a credit to the author, who not only wrote it but designed and typeset it himself, as well as commissioning a most attractive illustration for the cover.