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A review by prcizmadia
Chameleo by Robert Guffey
3.0
Reading this made me keep reflecting on Heller: "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't after you." It sounds like the main protagonist (antagonist?) was stuck in this loop. But I also can't help but wonder, is this what happens when you let your friends wind themselves up on a flight of fancy? Especially when you are indulging the paranoid fantasies of an addict in the process of hitting bottom?
All that aside, it's a fairly entertaining read about the kind of proto-fascist skulduggery that typified the post-9/11, Patriot Act aughts that just seems so quaint now. I shouldn't feel nostalgia for that but I do, in a world where the Capitol was literally overrun by a legion of unmoored paranoid fantasists. But it really loses steam with all these verbatim transcripts and a far-too-credulous interview with a scientist that seems to close the matter for some... but certainly not for me.
But maybe that's the wider point: when you lose a connection with objective reality, it's very easy to self-refer you further down the spiral into deeper disconnection. That's definitely part of what I got out of this.
All that aside, it's a fairly entertaining read about the kind of proto-fascist skulduggery that typified the post-9/11, Patriot Act aughts that just seems so quaint now. I shouldn't feel nostalgia for that but I do, in a world where the Capitol was literally overrun by a legion of unmoored paranoid fantasists. But it really loses steam with all these verbatim transcripts and a far-too-credulous interview with a scientist that seems to close the matter for some... but certainly not for me.
But maybe that's the wider point: when you lose a connection with objective reality, it's very easy to self-refer you further down the spiral into deeper disconnection. That's definitely part of what I got out of this.