KINGDOM OF FEAR (2003)

Despite the publisher's assurance that the book is ''a true memoir,'' Thompson -- once the gonzo author-hero of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, now a parody of the same -- strikes closer to the mark in proclaiming his slack sentences ''gibberish'' and ''crude hashish ravings.'' The political comments are rabid foamings; the anecdotes melt into useless freakishness. (Have you heard the one about an overturned Cadillac, two hookers, and a flock of sheep?) While a few reminiscences of run-ins with Johnny Law come within shouting distance of coherence, most whir gratingly away as Thompson weaves toward his crowning insight: ''I have the soul of a teenage girl in the body of an elderly dope fiend.''