A Prophet Operating at a Loss
 Zane P. Bond
 (Reviewed by The Editor - Rebecca Brown)
 2001 Writers Club Press/iUniverse.com
  ISBN: 0595183093
Amazon's Value Price is: $14.95

Co-authored with Lucy Freeman. A life & death struggle to survive the mental illness of manic/depression.

From Zane Bond's Foreword, which he wrote himself, the reader is forewarned that this compelling memoir is going to be about Zane, & his take on the life & times of a person caught in the clutches of an invidious, intractable mental illness.

What I like about Zane Bond's writing is his skill at the double entendre. In fact I have not yet read a book so well endowed -- it is mind-boggling! Inspite of his mental illness, he has written an engaging & exhausting, hilarious & horrifying memoir of where he came from, how it all started & what happened for all of his life.

Reading a book about the mental illness called manic/depression written by a bipolar person, is an extreme experience! At first I surmised that Zane Bond had not bothered to enlist the efforts of an editor, & then I realized what I was reading & the effort it took for this man to get it all on paper!

Reviewing a book about a manic/depressive's story is a challenge. There are not enough exclamation marks in any language to alert you, the moderately sane Reader, to the fast-forward motion of the ride ahead. When you start A Prophet Operating at a Loss, I guarantee you will not, during the time it takes you to read it, see your life in the same way, & perhaps, never the same way again!

For the most part, Zane Bond is coherent & articulate -- until you think about what he has written & then you get a whiff of seething synapses & the taste of burnt brain cells. He has been considerate of his readers, however, & kept his paragraphs short even though the leaps between them sometimes seem like black holes. His chapters range through a forest of philosophies, insights & stories. Occasionally I became lost or overcome, as I followed this man's memories through the first growth of his mind!

A remarkable effort that will leave you breathless, on edge, & looking at your life a-new with more relief & gratitude than before you picked up A Prophet Operating at a Loss!
(03/24/02)

Rebecca