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sueking365's review
3.0
I love old VW buses. My friend owns one and he loaned me this book, which centers on a surf trip from CA to Mexico in one of these buses. What a wild trip! Bad Karma is certainly the case. You want to feel bad for the author and his 2 “friends” for some of the situations they get in, but the friends are such jerks and the author himself should have known better. Ah well, such is the story of youth. Curious about the hijinks on this trip? Let’s just say that El Chapo the drug kingpin figures into the story (before he became the kingpin) and that the author had to wait for the statute of limitations to expire before he could write it.
engpunk77's review against another edition
3.0
A gift from a friend who visited last summer, I thought I'd never get to reading this; my TBR is over 1,000 and I had no reason to add this to it. But a January 2021 book challenge required that I read "a book about Karma," so looks like the time has come! No more guilt!
Aptly titled, Wilson frames some obnoxious, immoral behavior and god-awful decisions as the acts that earn him some bad karma. I couldn't stand this surfer dude, and I looked forward to seeing him earn his just desserts. Never once rooting for him, I did enjoy the vicarious surfer trip via VW bus through Mexico that was doomed from the start. Chapter 5 had me laughing uncontrollably, and the rest was a wild ride. I appreciated how positively Mexican culture was portrayed, but I didn't love the writing style. Wilson is not a professional writer but had a life experience worth telling, so I'm not going to judge. I doubt I can write any better! But he did keep me engaged, so this is a solid 3-star book. I'd recommend this to anyone who wants a light read about a misguided surfer's misadventures in which he earns himself some bad karma and reaps its consequences over the course of 5 weeks.
Aptly titled, Wilson frames some obnoxious, immoral behavior and god-awful decisions as the acts that earn him some bad karma. I couldn't stand this surfer dude, and I looked forward to seeing him earn his just desserts. Never once rooting for him, I did enjoy the vicarious surfer trip via VW bus through Mexico that was doomed from the start. Chapter 5 had me laughing uncontrollably, and the rest was a wild ride. I appreciated how positively Mexican culture was portrayed, but I didn't love the writing style. Wilson is not a professional writer but had a life experience worth telling, so I'm not going to judge. I doubt I can write any better! But he did keep me engaged, so this is a solid 3-star book. I'd recommend this to anyone who wants a light read about a misguided surfer's misadventures in which he earns himself some bad karma and reaps its consequences over the course of 5 weeks.
ibrow's review
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
fast-paced
3.0
The book equivalent of someone telling you a long, funny, ridiculous travel story. Has surprisingly little to do with surfing, mostly just a series of misadventures where everything that can go wrong, does.
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