Following the treatment, Orff periodically hallucinates, finding that spherical found objects (a stone on the banks of the River Thames, a football, a cabbage) appear to him as the dismembered head of Orpheus.

The scenes retelling the Orpheus myth are interspersed with Orff's daily life as he finds a new girlfriend, is hospitalised after suffering an attack of angina, bumps repeatedly into a character referred to as "Gom Yawncher" who turns up in various guises throughout London, and travels to The Hague to see the Vermeer painting in the Mauritshuis.

The novel's title is on one level a reference to Orff's preference for sitting up late at night listening to female classical singers on shortwave radio.

Although never a big seller, the book was well received critically, with The Listener commenting: "in the course of this tour through the imaginative outback of Mr. Hoban's mind, we are treated to brilliant flashes of mordant humour, not to mention splendidly baroque evocations of present day London" while The New York Times remarked "There's a sense of wonder in these passages...a love of fantasy and myth-making, an interest in language and puns, and a concern with philosophic speculation and the pyrotechnics of storytelling.

"[2] Dave Langford reviewed The Medusa Frequency for White Dwarf #99, and stated that "The book is souffle rather cornflakes: a light and tasty treatment of material which could be depressingly Heavy.