Chasing Pynchon's Rainbows

[Ya Sam]

By GENDY ALIMURUNG

"Wednesday, November 29, 2006 - 6:00 pm
Screw the owls. Boy wizard Harry Potter may have The Order of the Phoenix 
and the Dementors’ kiss, but Thomas Pynchon, who is man — all man — has 
Gravity’s Rainbow and the V-2 rocket. On this, the eve of the publication of 
Against the Day, we have gathered to count down to midnight at Skylight 
Books in Los Feliz to tip the best-seller scales in favor of Pynchon, grand 
master of the postmodern novel, and give challenge to Harry Potter’s 
cultural supremacy. And by “we” I mean a ragtag bunch of late-night 
browsers, the bookstore clerk girls, several local Skylight regulars, a 
handful of Pynchon fanboys, a homeless guy or two and a cat.

Charles Hauther, buyer for Skylight Books, came up with the idea. “I 
figured, if every year we have a midnight-release sale for the new Harry 
Potter novels, then why not for Pynchon, the greatest novelist of all time?”

He’s a bear of a guy, Hauther, possessing a stature worthy of Joyce or 
Melville. So far, he has the only reading copy of the new Pynchon tucked 
behind the counter. A guy idling by the register — in shorts, even though 
it’s night and cold; in a hat, even though it’s not sunny — who looks not 
unlike a grown-up Harry Potter, reaches over and absently flips the book 
open.

“Hey,” Hauther snaps. “Did you just read the last page?”

“Yes.”

“Unacceptable.”

A well-orchestrated event must have a plan. The Skylight plan is to move the 
snacks and the wine and the Perrier bottles, along with plastic cups, onto 
the table in the back, where someone, Hauther presumably, has already 
assembled a mini–Pynchon paperback buffet. The books, titles pulled from the 
store’s collection, are arrayed in neat stacks: V, Mason & Dixon, Slow 
Learner, Vineland, Gravity’s Rainbow. Hauther even special-ordered the 
illustrated Gravity’s Rainbow, the one where the artist drew a picture to 
correspond with every single page of Pynchon’s novel, but it didn’t arrive 
in time. “It had some trouble getting past customs,” he rolls his eyes, then 
snorts, “Canada. Hey, where’s The Crying of Lot 49?”

It is 11 p.m. At midnight, they’ll start slashing open the boxes.

Frequently asked questions: So, have you actually read Gravity’s Rainbow? 
So, what’s your favorite Pynchon novel? So, how many people do you think are 
going to show up tonight?

“I don’t know,” says Hauther, for the 1,085th time.

“But if you had to give it a number, what would you say?” Grown-up Harry 
Potter guy is nothing if not persistent.

“I’d say . . . 25.”

“Now, let me ask you this,” Potter guy continues. “If you can have a 
midnight selling for Thomas Pynchon on the eve of his novel’s release, then 
why not, on December 4, have a midnight book sale for the real greatest 
novelist of all time, Thomas Harris, and Hannibal Rising?”

“Oh my god,” says Hauther, “just, oh my god.”

By 11:30, the Brie is oozing, the Cabernet flowing. Women nuzzle the store 
cat, Lucy, whose job is to watch over the books at night. There is a pool 
going as to how many insane freaks — scratch that — devoted lovers of 
literature will show up to buy Against the Day mere minutes after Southern 
California bookstores are legally allowed to sell it. The Skylight 
bookseller girls, I decide, are terribly cute, in that sexy-librarian sort 
of way. They all seem to be wearing little tartan skirts and ballet flats, 
but they’re talking about how, yes, there really are serial killers in your 
attic. One of them separates from the pack to offer me wine in a plastic 
cup. Kerrie Kvashay-Boyle moved to this neighborhood three years ago 
specifically for the bookstore, so she could work there after graduating 
from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. She smiles. It is just not fair: smart, 
cute and nice.

“It’s such a macho thing,” she’s saying, “Pynchon and his thousand-page 
novel. It’s like Harry Potter for grown-ups. It’s kind of exciting, thinking 
that Pynchon himself could show up, and nobody would even know it.”

Just the other evening, one of the three episodes of The Simpsons featuring 
a cameo appearance by Pynchon aired. Lisa and Moe the bartender go to a lit 
convention, and if you look closely, you’ll see the ever-mysterious Pynchon 
seated in the audience. You know it’s him because he’s wearing a paper bag 
over his head. Coincidence? Perhaps. But I quote Pynchon, who quotes Wernher 
von Braun: “Nature does not know extinction; all it knows is 
transformation.”

At midnight, people cheer and the boxes are opened. Someone hands me a small 
card that I’m to use to redeem the book I paid for earlier in the evening. 
The card says, “Hello! My Name Is Thomas Pynchon.”

Twenty big, macho books go out to 20 big, macho Pynchonites. Then Hauther 
claps his hand on my shoulder. “Thanks for coming, guys,” he says, turning 
to catch one of the sales clerks headed toward the back. “And make sure you 
clean up all that cheese.”

http://www.laweekly.com/general/a-considerable-town/chasing-pynchons-rainbows/15110/

_________________________________________________________________
Don't just search. Find. Check out the new MSN Search! 
http://search.msn.click-url.com/go/onm00200636ave/direct/01/