I can't believe that I have finally finished this book! It took me five whole months to do it, which, taking into consideration that I'm a very fast reader and generally enjoy most of the fiction I happen to come across, is unbelievable. During these five months, I've actually returned "Catch-22" to the library two or three times when I got particularly frustrated; then cooled off a bit and tried my best to gave it another shot. Not surprisingly, having finally turned the last page of "Catch-22", I can officially declare that this Joseph Heller's "masterpiece" is the worst book I have ever read. So far, it is the second book on the list that I hated, but comparing to it, "Clockwork Orange" actually was a very easy and enjoyable read.

To be honest, I can't even tell what "Catch-22" was about. Moreover, I have a very strong suspicion that Heller was on crack when writing it. The whole story is based on life of a young man, Yossarian, who servers in the US forces in Italy during the Second World War. This story, however, is no more than a collection of chapters devoid of both chronological order and meaning that constantly jump from one topic, character, or event to another. All of the events happening in the book are an absolute nonsense, which, I guess, is supposed to be satirical or at least funny. I did understand that, in choosing this style of narration, one of the author's intention was perhaps to criticize how absurd can bureaucracy in the military or elsewhere be, but, unfortunately, this understanding did not make reading the book any more pleasant.

To summarize my experience, I can just say that "Catch-22" is a pretty long book, and I was confused for the most part of it. I could hardly keep track of the characters and events, which only added to my frustration. Only a few of hundreds of absurd situations described by the author have made me laugh, but it definitely was more of a hysterical giggle caused by my brain boiling from all the confusing information. If the author, indeed, had some point he wanted to bring across, he has lost me after just a few chapters. Finally, "Catch-22", in my opinion, is similar of some of those very abstract paintings, like "Black Square" by Malevich: People claim to admire them because some bunch of drunken critics once said that it was a good thing, but quietly think that it was a total waste of both paper and their time.

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