Product Description

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is the best chronicle of drug-soaked, addle-brained, rollicking good times ever committed to the printed page.  It is also the tale of a long weekend road trip that has gone down in the annals of American pop culture as one of the strangest journeys ever undertaken.

Now this cult classic of gonzo journalism is a major motion picture from Universal, directed by Terry Gilliam and starring Johnny Depp and Benicio del Toro.  Opens everywhere on May 22, 1998.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1350 in Books
• Published on: 1998-05-12
• Released on: 1998-05-12
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

Amazon.com Reviews
Heralded as the "best book on the dope decade" by the New York Times Book Review, Hunter S. Thompson's documented drug orgy through Las Vegas would no doubt leave Nancy Reagan blushing and D.A.R.E. founders rethinking their motto. Under the pseudonym of Raoul Duke, Thompson travels with his Samoan attorney, Dr. Gonzo, in a souped-up convertible dubbed the "Great Red Shark." In its trunk, they stow "two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high-powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half-full of cocaine and a whole galaxy of multicolored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers.... A quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls," which they manage to consume during their short tour.

On assignment from a sports magazine to cover "the fabulous Mint 400"--a free-for-all biker's race in the heart of the Nevada desert--the drug-a-delic duo stumbles through Vegas in hallucinatory hopes of finding the American dream (two truck-stop waitresses tell them it's nearby, but can't remember if it's on the right or the left). They of course never get the story, but they do commit the only sins in Vegas: "burning the locals, abusing the tourists, terrifying the help." For Thompson to remember and pen his experiences with such clarity and wit is nothing short of a miracle; an impressive feat no matter how one feels about the subject matter. A first-rate sensibility twinger, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is a pop-culture classic, an icon of an era past, and a nugget of pure comedic genius. --Rebekah Warren

From the Inside Flap
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is the best chronicle of drug-soaked, addle-brained, rollicking good times ever committed to the printed page. It is also the tale of a long weekend road trip that has gone down in the annals of American pop culture as one of the strangest journeys ever undertaken.

Now this cult classic of gonzo journalism is a major motion picture from Universal, directed by Terry Gilliam and starring Johnny Depp and Benicio del Toro. Opens everywhere on May 22, 1998.

From the Back Cover
"A scorching epochal sensation!" --Tom Wolfe

"The best book on the dope decade." --The New York Times Book Review

Customer Reviews

A classic
I read this first in college, and then again recently. It's still just as funny and wonderful as ever.

Great book, unfortunatell i've seen the movie
Just to be short, this book is great. Unfortunately for me, i've seen the movie for 5 or 6 times before reading it, so the book just felt repetitive. Especially since all the movie is like a quote of the book. Which is great if i wouldn't have seen the movie.

So if you liked the movie, you'll definitely like this book. No surprises there, but some of the blurry situations in the movie are cleared out.

For those who haven't seen the movie, you should read the book first. it makes the movie so much rewarding, and of course, you don't want to miss Hunter S Thompson's great writing skills. He just writes everything the way he thinks and sees (hence the idea of Gonzo journalism).

Great Book
My father had always liked hunter thompson but i had yet to read him. When my friend told me of this book I knew I had to check it out. What a trip. If you're looking for a straight forward book that explains everything with a nice plot and central characters who learn valuable life lessons...then this isn't the book for you. In many ways I say this book rings more true than most others. The character is really just an everyday druggie with a job and a hotel room in Vegas. The writing is superb and the illustrations were out of this world (literally). Even if you saw the movie and didn't like it, i would still read this book. It explains a lot more.