Top 10 Reasons Why AtD Sucks

[mikebailey at speakeasy.net]

so there are better character interactions in the book?

...
10 things I enjoy about it (purely subjective):

10. Long book, lots of detailed plots, weird names - 
this is the kind of novel I like, to begin with
  
9. a serious Bodine - and the name "Oh I see"

8. Merle's studies and heartbreaks are a standout,
but the Chums have some great moments; watching the 
Traverses, making the Becker connection for Vineland;
Vibe is a great, complex villain - why do
people say Pynchon doesn't do characters?  Dally
doing the Lost-Generation-in-Paris thing in Venice
is pretty cool, too...

7. the sense that there is more to be found

6. the way that it defies simplistic interpretation

5. pointers back to real life - the math and history
references,  as well as depictions of "moments we've 
all had" such as leavetakings, mistrust, love

4. the "slight differences" of the fictional world:
Constance Penhallow, the Chums
and their worldwide network - I could write a
paper on any of those; and if Pynchon wanted to
license his world like some writers do, we could
see a shelf full of Chums adventures in B. Dalton's...

3. the magical realism, flights of fancy juxtaposed with quite
realistic detail - something that bubbled up in
"The Secret Integration" but wasn't there in V. at all,
was hinted at in 49, jes grew in GR, and for the first
time got organized and used systematically in M&D,
here yet further developed...
this is a different point
than the "slight differences" which are just things
like people who exist in AtD that don't in this world,
or things people could have decided to do, like having
ballooning clubs worldwide, but didn't - 
these are warps like the hollow earth, sand-traveling,
atomic lighters, the ice-demon... 

2. the world traveling (and, to reiterate point 7,
the sense that maybe there's a scheme behind it all
that will gradually come to light)

1. the sentences, words, new ways of saying things,
which is after all what novels offer more than other media.

> On 6/21/07, Henry Winkler <rushm0r3 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > No. It's not.
> >
> >
> > On 6/21/07, David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Actually, this menage-a-trois, especially the growing emotional
> > > connections between the three, is one of the best character
> > > interactions in the book, IMHO.
> > >