Reddit reviews Zizek's Ontology: A Transcendental Materialist Theory of Subjectivity (Studies in Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy)

I started with a few essays by zizek and like you, started with Puppet and the Dwarf as my first book of his. And I felt like it was slightly over my head.

So I bought Adrian Johnston's book on Zizek's Ontology. Which was more than a simple summary of Zizek's thought. It was complex enough to keep my mind reeling, but less fuzzy than Zizek was to me at the time. Basically it was the base I needed to understand all the terms and philosophers that Zizek uses without explanation.

If I remember Zizek's quote about the book, it was: "This book is more Zizek than myself"

I've personally not read much of his direct work, but I do know that a good analysis of the Zizek's core philosophical arguments (and work in general, as it goes over both his early and late writings) is Zizek's Ontology by Adrian Johnston. If what you find there tickles your fancy, then it's likely everything else Zizek has written will too.

http://www.amazon.com/Zizeks-Ontology-Transcendental-Subjectivity-Phenomenology/dp/0810124564

Well, I would really recommend this excellent book by Adrian Johnston, that tries to synthesize and organize Zizek's thought, especially to explain the crux of his theoretical project that consists in the encounter between lacanian psychoanalysis and German idealism (what Johnston names "transcedental materialism") and gives a clear and comprehensive look at its develompment. In a way it's way better then the original, even Žižek admits it:

"It is always difficult to read books about oneself; with Johnston's book, my anxiety was even stronger than usual. While reading it, I often had the uncanny feeling of being confronted by a line of argumentation which fits better than my own texts what I am struggling to formulate--as if he is the original and I am a copy. He certainly knows how to read me. The majority of my critics concentrate on popular culture, politics, and ideology in my work--Johnston goes directly to its transcendental-ontological nucleus. This is not a book on me, but a book, critical of me, on what both Johnston and I consider the core of our philosophical predicament. I thus advise the reader to forget about me and to enjoy the hard work of penetrating the obscure dimension of the philosophical foundations of psychoanalysis."

edit: added Žižek's quote