Word: novels
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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After the vast tundra of his last book, Against the Day, which was a thousand-plus pages, with more than a hundred or so scurrying characters and a shape-shifting plot that went everywhere and nowhere, Thomas Pynchon has decided to give his fan base a break. His seventh novel is practically beach reading. Inherent Vice (Penguin Press; 369 pages) is a comic-noir detective tale set in Los Angeles around 1970, not long after the Manson murders added their special note to the already twitchy local vibe...
...also a Pynchon novel, meaning it's a wizardly bit of philosophical burlesque, with densely packed speculations on the hidden hands that shape history and with notions of reality that are elastic enough to allow for astral twins, could-be zombies and old spirits rustling at the margins. The Pynchon wiki sites have been poised for months to group-grope every sentence for hidden meanings. They won't be disappointed. (See the top 10 reclusive celebrities...
...even if this is second-tier Pynchon, it's still entertainment of a high order. It was only a matter of time before he would write a private-eye novel. Each of his books has been built around a character - or two or 12 - on a quest into the heart of a mystery that is never quite solved. The difference here is that Pynchon finally makes one of those characters a licensed gumshoe, albeit one with an incongruous hippie backstory. "Doc" Sportello is an ambling longhair with links to the surfer world and an appetite for controlled substances that would...
Such a defense, if successful, would have also introduced a novel meaning of copyright law as it applies to digital media. Nesson's argument, Gertner said, would have legalized any downloading of copyrighted material so long as it was used for a person's private enjoyment...
...crosses him. When Simon's assistant Judy (Gina McKee) says that certain classified information "falls well within my purview," Malcolm explodes: "Within your purview? Where do you think you are, some f---in, Regency costume drama? This is a government department, not some f---in, Jane f---in, Austen novel!" And the movie is not one of those genial Brit rom-coms like Notting Hill or Four Weddings and a Funeral. It's closer to the high-IQ ranting in plays by John Osborne and TV dramas by Dennis Potter. Put all these witty, rancid voices together and you hear...