Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates (2001) - Plot & Excerpts
Probably my favorite Tom Robbins novel, one of the few with a male protagonist (some of his books focus on female leads, and a few have couples, but the narration generally focuses on the woman). Switters, the nymphet-chasing secret agent and self described "acquired taste," finds himself confined to a wheelchair. A shaman's curse (the price of a psychedelic revelation) condemns him to death if his feet ever touch the ground. He starts the novel in love with his underage step sister, working for the CIA, and fully ambulatory. His adventures take him around the world and through theological intrigue, but the main feature of this book is really Switters as a character. The plot, although clever and fun to follow, is mostly a way of putting him in various situations where he can discourse on the meaning of life, language, and pleasure. A friend of mine who also loves this author told me that Switters seemed to her to be the Tom Robbin's character who is the most like Tom Robbins, and this seems intuitively true. For one thing, the content of Switters' monologues, both inner and outer, echo themes that resonate throughout his other novels, and seem in this novel to be gathered in one voice. Also, the form of Switters' speeches echoes the author's style of wording and imagery. The greatest joy of reading Tom Robbins is the way he plays with language as something oral, something that we hear with our ears and make with our mouths. He does things with writing that can only be done in writing, but he never lets the reader forget that language is something sensual, and he invokes the sounds of words, the music of sentences, and even descriptions that vividly sexualize the mechanics of a character (female or male, but usually female) actually pronouncing a certain word. Except for Nabokov, who Robbins seems to be pretty obviously paying homage to (and perhaps lovingly mocking) with parallels and allusions to "Lolita," no other novelist I've read has captured the sensuality of language on this level. Languages, accents, and even speech impediments seem to be elevated to the highest objects of aesthetic appreciation in Robbins novels. Robbins can write a conversation, or a thought about a conversation, or even a thought about a word with as much guilty, indulgent enjoyment and libidinal gravity as anyone else can write a sex scene. An employee at an independent bookstore (Liftbridge books, Brockport NY, highly recommended) that Robbins is one of a few specific authors who they regularly argue over putting in "fiction" or "literature," and his work does have the same guilty-pleasure value of trashy novels, and always seems to end happily. Despite that, as someone who appreciates language as something that is at once abstract and intimately connected to us as bodies, I find great intellectual value in his work.
A 2.5For the first third of this book I alternated thinking it was brilliant and banal. Then it mostly bored me. Switters annoyed me. I kept thinking how aggravating he would be in real life. His pompous shenanigans did not strike me as half as witty as the character (and the author) seemed to think they were. I tired of him. I also did not understand the author’s choice to mostly tell the story through Switters, but then at times step out and play narrator, even a few times addressing the reader directly. It did not work for me. The change in voice was awkward and broke the tempo of the book. Robbins also used way too many over the top similes, metaphors and descriptions. Although occasionally creative and enjoyable, more often they were taxing. It added to the pompous nature of the book that turned me off. I enjoyed the overall themes of the book: religion, modernity, women’s issues, spirituality. Robbins raises some interesting ideas and makes some poignant observations about modern western culture. I also appreciated the grand scheme of the plot. Convoluted as it might be, it worked.Although Maestra was a memorable character, she seemed too much of an anomaly to me. Her spy knowledge and tech expertise seemed very out of place, and devoid of explanation. Her skills seemed to exist solely to give the author an authority to keep Switters in check. Spoilers ahead:There were a few other items that did not make the grade. Twice Switters unloads his pistol and people laugh it off, once into the boat, and a second time at the lock in compound. The first one is the biggie. You mean to tell me that if I owned a medium sized boat and someone shot into it a number of times, I would not mind? Also, if Maestra, Suzi and others thought something was legitimately wrong with his legs, why did they not question the fact that Switters was still driving? Finally, I realize the curse is arbitrary, but why would stilts be ok, but shoes not ok? If his feet could not touch the ground, wouldn’t shoes do the trick? These are not major plot holes, but annoyed me none the less. I don’t think I will be reading any more books by Robbins. He does not seem to be my cup of tea.
What do You think about Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates (2001)?
Robbins could write his way into the panties of any grammar compulsive, vocabulary obsessed school marm and somehow make it seem as if it were her idea. This book is a romp of words and spuriously decorative suggestion, at once a curious mix of cartoon and spiritual incisive wisdom.As with anything Robbinesque it requires suspension of belief while simultaneously challenging and championing belief. Tongue in cheek with Robbins requires opening your interpretation of that colloquialism to all parts of the anatomy.A little tiring is his dependence on remarkable coincidence time and again. And some might criticize his almost masterbatory use of metaphor and simile, but hey, he never pretended to be Hemmingway and it's nice to see english words in print that you don't often run across.So, if you are willing to wade into the kaleidoscopic spider web of his musings, you'll be rewarded with more than the usual fare of insights and chuckles.
—Rowland Bismark
Sometimes you find a book at the wrong time in your life, and you think how much you would have liked it if you had read it 10 years ago. This is one of those books for me.I kept reading anyways, probably because there are enough funny/interesting parts to propel you through the annoying parts.Someone recommended it to me when I was a college freshman, but I only recently got around to reading it. He told me something along the lines of "you're sex positive, so you would enjoy this sexy romp of a book." I don't remember exactly how he described it, but something like that. I probably would have like it back then as an eighteen year old, because it is raunchy and seemingly philosophical. I say seemingly, because if you let yourself be whipped around by Robbins' wordplay, it seems clever, but if you really pay attention, it's fairly routine sort of philosophizing. And a lot of trying waaaaay too hard to point out some truth or theory about humanity. WAAAAAY too hard. I kept thinking, "Um, is that it? Am I suposed to be in suspense?" Nope.But really why this book is wrong for the 28 year old me is the disappointing extent to which women are discussed and portrayed. The unbelievably standard view of teenage virgins as the ultimate in sexiness is presented as a risky taboo in the book. Oh! The shocking desires of the main character! (/sarcasm) Is there any sexual desire LESS predictable??? I think not. Not to mention all the descriptions of sex scenes that are so not what get women all hot and bothered--even though he implies that aaaaall the women in the book want it, and they want it from Switters soooo bad. I don't know why so many guys think that girls love it when you twist and pinch our nipples, but we don't. Really. We don't. Stop that.I'm pretty sure this book is who the author wishes he was--super clever CIA agent that all the girls are after, having crazy adventures and saying any random thing he thinks, all of which come out sounding clever and deep. Good for you, Robbins, I'm glad you have dreams.
—Robin
Tom Robbins pays a peculiar type of homage to American ideals and Christian philosophy throughout the hilariously verbose and seriously playful criticism that fill the pages of this adventure. Our story follows the ramblings of a wheel-chaired man named Switters. Ex-CIA, brilliant linguist and, above all else, lover of innocence, Switters is a real to life, heroic non-believer. Rooted in Buddhist sentimental pragmatism, he transcends struggles with his wholesome and psychotic laughter, demonstrating the power of consciousness while skipping all the neurotic messes of the mind through a simple and passionate commitment to wine and women (life). Traveling the world in a wheelchair, Switters encounters all sorts of outrageous characters. It is fun to ride along, taking in all the different ideas.
—Caleb
