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List Price: $24.95 | | Publisher: Riverhead Hardcover
Salesrank: 553758
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| Our Price: $1.19 |
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| Media: Hardcover |
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Editorial Review:
It's 2023, and Guy Fontaine is an unwilling new resident at Mission Pescadero, an assisted-living facility outside San Francisco. It doesn't take him long to realize that his fellow residents have reverted to the lifestyles they embraced in the sixties, complete with sex, drugs, and rock and roll (with a little Viagra thrown in for good measure). The Mission Pescadero staff, and the world outside, would like nothing more than to forget these aging hippies, but the residents want-no, demand-to be treated with respect and dignity. And they'll fight for it. When one resident's prohibited cat is discovered by Mission Pescadero's domineering administrator, the resulting confrontation mushrooms into an epic battle between authority and anarchy, complete with twenty-four-hour media coverage and the involvement of California's governor, Drew Barrymore. As tensions escalate, Guy finds himself cast as an unlikely radical in a drama he doesn't understand.
By turns outrageous, hilarious, and, ultimately, touching, Tim Sandlin's new novel is a fascinating exploration of how the baby boomers are facing their own mortality. Jimi Hendrix Turns Eighty is Sandlin at his iconoclastic best.
Jimi Hendrix Turns Eighty Reviews:
The Bookschlepper Recommends 
2008-06-20 - Guy Fontaine is an Okie (although not from Muskogee) who, in 2022, finds himself in assisted living on the California coast with the 70- and 80-year olds of Haight Ashbury and the Summer of Love. It only takes him a few days to learn to appreciate the finer points of sex, drugs and rock `n roll. But he's still a Heartlander, not bound by ideas of peace, love and harmony when the facility's director decides to euthanize a cat. As the assisted community reverts to commune, the music blares, the bras come off, the Viagara appears and the Man is at the gate. It's a hoot-and-a-half. The humor rings true and there is no patronizing these dudes. I appreciate that.
A new discovery
2008-06-10 - I learned of Tim Sandlin through the humor author Christopher Moore. I did a little research on Sandlin and decided to give one of his novels a try. I was not disappointed. Jimi Hendrix Turns Eighty is at times clever, humorous, and ultimately touching. Many of the reviews have disparaged the ending. However, I felt it was massively apropos and true to the tricks of life. Great success and highs are followed by lows and heartache. And time keeps marching on.
Although some of the characters are underdeveloped, and the novel has a few too many digressions for my taste, it is overall a satisfying read. Not only that, but there were some profound revelations about the nature of life, including this line from a character; "Beauty is heartbreaking and heartbreak is life-affirming, therefore beauty is a heartbreaking form of life affirmation." Words that only those who have lived can truly appreciate.
I will say, that I did not find the novel as funny as Mr. Moore's novels, but what humor there was seemed appropriate and fit the scene. Sandlin tried hard to steer clear of shtick, and I for one appreciate the attempt. I will definitely investigate more of Sandlin's novels.
Could this be for real!?!? 
2008-05-30 - Reading about anyone in a nursing home is depressing... even moreso when you realize that they could be writing about you!!
Jimi Hendrix Turns Eighty really isn't that far-fetched when one reconsiders that we often relive our experiences: our parents want us to like what they like, we want our kids to be like us, etc. So what's so unusually to think that a group of senior hippies might stage a sit-in at their nursing home, or jam to music of the 60s?
This book was fun to read, and certainly well written. However, I think the author fell a bit short in reaching a conclusion. I would have felt better knowing that a group of retired hippies might have genuinely come to some logical (and reasonable) conclusions instead of a neatly wrapped ending. Still, I found it a good-enough read to hold my interest. I would recommend it.
The Scariest Humor Ever
2008-05-04 - If you already love Tim Sandlin as I do, you'll find that his unique, quirky humor continues here. Tim has a way of breaking life down into simple body functions.I'm pretty sure the number of references to drool and spit in this book is some kind of literary record. While still hilarious at times,the dark side of this book hit me harder than any of his others, the love, loss and parenting in his other books are pretty open ended subjects, but old age as a subject runs up against the wall of iminent death and makes me think harder on that subject than is comfortable. I wanted to run right out,join a gym, beef up my IRA contribtions and re-write my will, and even that didn't make me think I would be safe from the fate shared by Sandlin's characters. This is the scariest funny book I've ever read.
Reads Well But Disappointing in the End
2008-04-27 - More than a novel, this is a story of the fears of growing old. Most of us fear that we will end up in an institution without any rites, being ordered to play bingo and shuffleboard. We fear being treated like children, given drugs that zap us out, put in a wheelchair and sat in front of a TV to watch "Regis and Kathy Lee" reruns all day. More than anything else we fear the loss of freedom of action (or inaction). If I wanted to be regimented, I would have joined the armed forces, or become a guerilla with the Grey Panther Liberation Forces.
Sandlin does a decent job putting all these fears together, at the same time he doesn't take everything to seriously either. The problem I had with the book was that it was much of a 'pastiche' as opposed to a coherent story. All the little anecdotes that he created are cute or funny, but that doesn't create a 'whole'.
