4.5 stars ... In thinking about what to rate this novel - which I thoroughly enjoyed - I went down a mental rabbit hole not unlike those encountered by our protagonist Doc Sportello and the assorted hippies, seekers, and burnouts that he meets in the pages of Inherent Vice. Does 5 stars mean its the best book I've ever read? What if I like the next book better? Do I have to go back and change this rating? Trying to describe the plot (which begins with Doc looking for his ex-girlfriend's missing new lover) is both pointless and impossible, but suffice it to say Pynchon has written a pointed, moving, and very funny account of the end of the 1960's counterculture dream. There is a great deal of affection in this novel for places and people that feel like shadows of a time when American society was balanced on an edge between something wonderful and the corporate/political Surveillance Culture we live in now. Inherent Vice is set at the end of the '60s but it's full of foreboding about the times we live in now, and that is both its genius and its power. Highly recommended. I have to get a few things out of the way before I start this review. I don't care about the 60's. I really don't. I've been force-fed so many nostalgia-tinged memories of hippy and freak culture that I'm bored of it. I also do not really know noir that well, though I intend to recitiy that this year. Finally, this is my first Pynchon novel. Inherent Vice has a couple of pretty major problems. These are the characters and the plot. There are a lot of characters. The main thing that differentiates them are their surreal names—a hallmark of Pynchon's writing, I believe. One or two feature one exaggerated personality trait, but ultimately the characters blend together so badly that it often took me a few paragraphs to remember who they were and why Doc, the protagonist, was talking to them. And then there are the female characters. These are all essentially interchangeable, and are differentiated almost entirely by what sexual act they're interested in. There's the anal sex one, the threesome one, the one Doc is having sex with, the one Doc used to have sex with, the stripper, & the bisexual maid. Now, I understand that characters are not necessarily what noir is about. Noir revolves around crazy intertwining plot lines. Inherent Vice has some of those. Unfortunately, the plot is generally incoherent, and comes together quickly and relatively uninterestingly. That said, this book is enjoyable at times when read moment by moment, scene by scene, with no eye to the big picture. The humour is sometimes insightful and rather funny and cutting. Unfortunately, by the mid-point of the book I was deeply bored with being flung from one "whacky," second-rate Hunter S. Thompson moment to the next, & basically done with Doc, whose personality, tone and mode of speech change almost entirely depending on who he is speaking to. This was not a great book. It got 3 stars instead of 2 because the first 100-odd pages were legitimately enjoyable. The rest not so much. As for my first experience with Pynchon, I'm not really impressed. This book at least felt like he was more concerned with making obscure references to genre and 60's icons and moments than creating characters or a worthwhile plot. I'm going to read one of his earlier books, as I realize this is him working in an unfamiliar genre.
Do You like book Vizio Di Forma (2009)?
I'm curious to see this on the screen. Some funny bits and riffs but mostly a snooze for me.
—Quinn_Ella
'sledge was right, you are one crazy white motherfucker.''how can you tell?''i counted.'
—carikawa
"The Big Lebowski" meets "Gravity's Rainbow."
—EMac
