Well I just reread Vineland and the news is still bad...

[David Morris]

Pale Fire's a fine construct/puzzle, but not a compelling novel.
That's OK, and not a "falling-off."  But I prefer the characters and
story of Lolita.

I think Ada was his attempt to combine characters/story with puzzle,
but the characters are uninteresting (who gives a damn about these
self-indulgent rich kids and their incestuous affair?) and the puzzle
has never been unearthed.

On 6/13/07, MalignD at aol.com <MalignD at aol.com> wrote:
> << Another example of this pattern is Nabokov after *Lolita* (but many will disagree). >>

>Lolita's a gem, but Pale Fire comes after, I think, and it's hard to
call that a falling-off. As for Ada, Transparent Things, ... opinions
will vary.