Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #62290 in Books
• Published on: 1995-05-22
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 978 pages

Customer Reviews

Only half good
This volume is the definative work on phenyl etheylamines (PE) that are used for "recreational" uses. It is a weighty volume, being some 2" thick. Unfortunately, the first inch of the volume is Shulgin's meandering "biography" of his life with PE, and to a chemist does not make much sense. This book should have been issued in two parts so that those who do not want to read Shulgin's drivel would be spared it.
But the second part - ah... the second part, to a chemist it is shear heaven. Shulgin really DOES know his chemistry, and the syntheses he describes are poetry - however, the kitchen sink chemist who is making them to sell on the black market would not get joy from this section - it is PURE organic synthesis, and the processes Shulgin describes would be difficult to replicate outside of a university or industrial lab. But to read it ( for an organic chemist) is to be transported to the seventh heaven. For this reason and this reason alone, I award it five stars

self obsessed but still of value
It is inevitable that a semi-autobiographical work on the function of the brain should do a fair bit of navel gazing. PiHKAL however pushes it a bit far. The Shulgins are a conceited pair, self congratulatory in their "perfect couple" self-eulogies and smug in their "Bach is for liberal sophisticates like us, Vagner is for cultural bigots unlike us" opinions. I find the notion that one need be of their class, tastes or education to experiment with psychoactives (an implication never quite made explicit) contemptable. That said, if you are genuinely interested in the funcion of psychoactive compounds on subjective experience (if not on objective brain function, an area totally omitted), it is worth wading through the bull. Boring people taking interesting substances.

An interesting read and certainly a talking point
The book tells what it assumed to be an autobiography of Alexander and Ann Shulgin (the names have been changed, probably due to the subject matter covered). The book has two main sections, the first section being the story of the two authors. It is full of insight and is a very good read, but I was left with a feeling that perhaps the accounts of the authors while taking drugs were a little too detailed and began to drag slightly (especially towards the end). The second section contains details about synthesis of drugs (yes, there is a 'recipe' for MDMA, but that's not really the point) and the details of their effects at different levels. All this adds up to a great book, definitely recommended but probably more for people with an interest in pschedelic drugs than light bedtime reading.