As a member of the generation it is purported to represent, when this book was published, reading anything after the third line in the corner of an MTV video was taxing enough. Add a couple decades and a ringing endorsement from Hubert Selby Jr. made it (at the absolute least) worth a look. It is so wry and in places so sublimely vulgar, that the inspiration for the white, disaffected protoEdgelords that are now barreling toward middle age rapidly, vapidly and anything but silently is so obvious only Ray Charles would miss it. (cause blind and dead. Get it? Har har har)
That said, nothing in any print medium - ever, in my sad so-called life - has made me laugh so.

On a related side note: the movie is as fucking awful as it gets. ( )