Castaneda - The art of dreaming etc

The art of dreaming, A separate reality, and Journey to Ixtlan. This is the order in which I read them. I decided to read Castaneda after discovering the books by Don Miguel Ruiz, that I will review at some stage in the future. Of course I had heard of Carlos Castaneda many times before but it always conjured a displeasing image of the lysergic Sixties. It was, instead, a real revelation for me, and so well related to everything else I've been intrigued with in recent times, like the astral plain, different realities, meditation, etc. I don't know who Don Juan was nor, for that matter, who Castaneda himself was, and it looks like it's going to stay that way. Here's my opinion. Castaneda has a most beautiful, lucid mind, he leads you with a sure hand into the most intriguing, scary, emotional dimensions. Like a real sorcerer he can manipulate your feelings, elate you and terrify you. Was his work non fiction or fiction? Was Don Juan real? Could you follow his teachings - but those were the teachings for Carlos, for you they may be very different. It doesn't matter. To learn, I believe, is what we are here for. How we learn is irrelevant. What surprises me, though, is that an author who sold millions in the 70s managed to escape the attention of any serious biographer. Is it me? I haven't found anything about his life that doesn't itself contain fiction, in the form of biographies written by his reincarnations, and the like. There was some criticism of his work by a number of anthropologists and some weird rumours surrounding his life post late 1970s. Apparently some of his followers were found dead, perhaps suicide, in the desert and, also apparently, he was preaching suicide. Why, what happened? Can anybody enlighten me?