Excitement over book releases are rarer these days---and then I remember all of the teeny-bopper unconsummated-love horror-pop genre fiction and I say, "Oh yeah...some folks really care about that stuff..."
So, I guess, if you like serious books about heady things, or like authors that are celebrated by heads and scholars alike, then when one of those authors delivers something new, you get excited.
I had plenty to do on that particular Tuesday, and checked to see when the book store closed---their website said 11 pm. It turns out that that was only for Friday and Saturday, and if I wanted to get there on this Tuesday in September, I had to make it by 10. When I realized this, it was, like, 9:38.
Where's the car parked? Do you really want to go right now? Can you even make it? Do they have a copy?
This is all pretty stupid, I was telling myself, but Corrie reminded me, "Hey--it's about the adventure, right? Screaming across town late at night might just be worth it..."
So, scream across town I did. I called as I huffed it out to the car to have them hold me a copy, then drove basically along the beach the entire length of our city to get to the one corporate bookstore I know about around town. Sitting at the last few stoplights, cursing and sweating, yelling at the lights and the randomly placed slow drivers, I was constantly aware of the car's clock, four minutes fast, mind you, but reading 10:01.
I tore ass into the parking lot, nearly skidded into a spot, 10:02 on the clock, I ran up to the door. The lights inside illuminated the fact that the door hadn't yet been locked, and the transient examining the bargain books by the door let me know they were still open. I smiled to myself, loosened up a bit, and let myself in.
I went right to the counter--I wasn't going to be wasting any of these workers' nights--and visually located the copy with the name "PATRICK" written on a piece of paper and rubber-banded together with it.
It was on a discount, too. Pretty sweet... My receipt says 9:58. Just made it, baby!
I texted you, Norm, as I got back to the car:
I'm just past 200 pages, which is almost halfway through it, and, damn, there is so much to say about it...
While my post isn't about a Tuesday in September back in '01, that hangs over this story like the proverbial ominous storm cloud. There is a disaster being brought upon the world by a type of evil that is manifested in greed and power struggles...nobody is quite sure what this disaster might prove to be, but of course we know.
You get the idea, reading it, that Pynchon began writing the book in his head, or maybe just working it out in his head, as a way of catharsis maybe right after the towers fell. It's like Against the Day meets Doc Spotello's investigation agency--by which I mean that you get the perspective of a transition era (in AtD it's the 19th-20th centuries) snuggled into a mysterious dilemma. It's also like Vineland in that it offers perspective on an era (the late '90s), but from less of a vantage point (right before 9/11, where in Vineland it's the '80s perspective on the '60s). But, like Mason & Dixon, since you know historically what the outcome will be, you get to supply your own perspective as well.
And, of course, he knows New York very well.
AND, the hero, or protagonist, like in The Crying of Lot 49, is a lady, a divorced Jewish mom, which is pretty cool. We should be able to amend our conversation about Pynchonian ladies all (mostly) being whores.
