Mindswap

By: Robert Sheckley

Narrated by: Tom Weiner

Interstellar travel to alien worlds is too expensive for Marvin, a college student in need of a good vacation. And so he signs up for what he can afford: a mind swap, in which his consciousness is swapped into the body of an alien life-form.

Unfortunately, Marvin finds himself in the body of an interstellar criminal—a body that he has to vacate, fast. But that criminal consciousness has stolen Marvin’s earthly body. Now Marvin has to find a body on the black market just to stay alive!

Travel with Marvin from world to world, each one crazier than the last, as he keeps finding far-from-ideal bodies in awful situations.

©1966 Robert Sheckley (P)2010 Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Critic reviews

“Sheckley has long been considered one of the genre's leading humorists.” ( New York Times Book Review)

“Always he crackles with ideas.” (Kingsley Amis)

“Witty and ingenious…A draught of pure Voltaire and tonic.” (J. G. Ballard)

Swap your brain and lose your body

R. Sheckley masterly ridicules psychology, history, cosmology and philosophy. Mindswap is a witty lampoon, a pastiche not meant to be taken seriously. In a Sheckleyan world anything can happen, verging on the absurd. Well, but doesn't our life seem absurd at times?
Perhaps, the idea behind Mindswap is that you can't take life (and reality) too seriously with its twists and turns. If you plunge into the unknown, don't try to explain things, take advantage of an alternative reality and have fun. I did!
But if it's your first encounter with Sheckley's waggish humour, I'd suggest Immortality Inc. and The Status Civilization for a start.

wow what a mind f*#%

it really seems as if Douglas Adams may have written this as an early rough draft for hitchhiker's guide to the Galaxy. Very similar concepts, similarly beyond the prosaic standards. Of course, completely unrelated authors. Definitely a fan of Robert Sheckley, though the book might have benefited from a tiny bit more focus and continuity in my opinion.
The narration is excellent, especially considering how difficult the text is, with its numerous unique characters and esoteric transitions.

Laugh out loud funny

I loved this book. The narrator was top-notch, all the voices added to the humour of the story. Towards the end, I sort of lost the hang of the story, did not know just what the hell was going on. But that doesn't take anything away from the book. I had no idea Sheckley was this good.

Author self-indulgence

After a good start the story becomes a vehicle for the author's self-indulgence at the expense of a story you want to follow. The idea was good, but the word play at the end was heavy handed.

Beyond

Listening to Mindswap is like a mind meld with an historian, philosopher, sociologist, political analyst, satirist,psychiatrist, detective and humorist. Enjoy!