The Ecstasy Conspiracy

Marcia Sweet, formerly head of the Douglas Library’s
Information/Reference Unit at Queen’s University, is currently an
Ottawa-based information consultant.

The Ecstasy Conspiracy is an ambitious attempt at a complex, literate
novel. The plot is clever: a story (murder plot) within a story writing
about a murder plot. There are quotations from Horace, and a recurring
Faustian theme.

But the book irritates. Choyce prefers choppy “thoughts” and
aphorisms to complete sentences, which gives his writing a breathless,
hyperbolic, character. The narrator is juvenile and banal, and neither
the characters nor the storyline ring true.

This novel alludes to a great literary tradition and reads like a comic
book.