Orange Sunshine

“Nicholas Schou manages—amazingly—to penetrate four decades of silence . . . The result is a mind-blowing scrap of found history, like something buried deep in the earth—and you cannot avert your eyes . . . With Orange Sunshine, Schou has crafted a definitive history of the dark side of the 1960s.”—Los Angeles Times

“Orange Sunshine is as close to an 'authorized' story as there's likely to be. Much of it reads more like fiction than history . . . the Brotherhood's story reads like some mystical adventure tale from a long-gone era. But for a peek at those heady times, Orange Sunshine is one worthy flashback.”—San Francisco Chronicle

"Journalist Nicholas Schou did yeoman's work digging into the story of the band of hippies that became a huge LSD cartel in the 1970s. He interviewed many former members, some of them not that happy to be found, earning their trust over some four years."—San Diego Union-Tribune

"OC Weekly reporter Nicholas Schou spent four years uncovering the brotherhood's surreal, largely unknown story, pulling together written accounts of its history and run-ins with the law and persuading brotherhood members to be interviewed decades after its demise . . . Read Schou's well-researched and compelling book to decide for yourself about the brotherhood's true legacy."—Orange Coast magazine

“His reporting is diligent, and his story comes mostly from the mouths of participants speaking for the first time on the record after decades of hiding deep underground. That story deserves to be told.”—Reason

"Orange Sunshine reads so much like classic Thomas Pynchon—with its mind-bending and hilarious tale of a secret society of mystic surfers who bomb Southern California with LSD—that the reader has to wonder: Is 'Nick Schou' a pseudonym?"—Mike Davis, author of City of Quartz, Planet of Slums, and In Praise of Barbarians

“Nick Schou has uncovered a bizarre, wild ride of a story that seems straight out of Easy Rider or Zabriskie Point—except it really happened. Orange Sunshine serves as a valuable time capsule from the American counterculture. It’s also one hell of a fun read.”—Rob Kirkpatrick, author of 1969: The Year Everything Changed

"Schou interviewed remaining Brotherhood members (who, unlike acid-gobbling pop musicians, seem to have largely retained their memories), gleaning impressive amounts of detail for his discussions of the ins and outs of the era’s drug trade and the moving of vast quantities of marijuana and hashish along with the LSD. Loaded with little-known historical mots, this is an excellent chronicle of a piece of history unlikely to be repeated."—Mike Tribby, Booklist

"Blue Cheer. Window Pane. Orange Sunshine. Maui Wowie. These were the brand names of the psychedelic counterculture of the 1960s and '70s, a culture led by the Brotherhood of Eternal Love. Chances are, if a brand of acid, pot or hashish was known to stoners, it first made its way into the underground market via the Brotherhood. Originally a marijuana-dealing motorcycle gang of toughs, the Brotherhood had a mass religious experience with LSD in 1965-they believed they'd found a lysergic shortcut to God. They resolved, under the charismatic leadership of John 'the Farmer' Griggs, whom Timothy Leary called 'the holiest man ever to live in this country,' to become apostles of acid with a mission to turn on the entire world. The Brotherhood established a church and a head shop called Mystic Arts World, which became the center of the psychedelic trade in Southern California and beyond. To fund their proselytizing, they smuggled high-quality marijuana from Mexico and introduced mind-blowingly potent hashish from Afghanistan, shipped via Pakistan to the United States in loaded VW campers. Before long, the Brotherhood had gone from acid church to 'hippie Mafia.' While Stewart Tendler and David May's The Brotherhood of Eternal Love (1984) approached this material as a true-crime story, journalist Schou (Kill the Messenger: How the CIA's Crack-Cocaine Controversy Destroyed Journalist Gary Webb, 2006) lets the Brothers and their many customers and hangers-on tell the story, resulting in an intimate portrait of the secret society that helped forge and spread hippie culture  . . . A fascinating read for any audience and essential history for anyone interested in the roots of psychedelia."—Kirkus Reviews

“Colorful . . . the mixture of lively freakery and stoned pomposity gives [Schou’s] portrait of countercultural excess an authentic period feel.”—Publishers Weekly