I guess a lot of things that are said in ["Illusions"] are the kind of sentences somebody might want to embroider on a sampler—or bake into a fortune cookie. Bach seems sincere—he even ends up a messiah himself in the book and says there's room at the top for everybody. Maybe there's some truth in this—I can't really tell one way or another. My own inclination after reading it was to think up some sayings of my own like, "If this book helps get you through the night, then it's better than Jack Daniels" and "Ideas are not necessarily true if you can't disprove them" and "Everybody is free to do anything, including ignore this book."

Richard R. Lingeman, "Books: New Wings, Old Seagull," in The New York Times (© 1977 by The New York Times Company; reprinted by permission), April 1, 1977, p. C27.