Inherent Vice: Pink Fade

[Dave Monroe]

On Tue, Aug 4, 2009 at 7:49 PM, Robin
Landseadel<robinlandseadel at comcast.net> wrote:

> Got my copy of Inherent Vice at Borders today. Place looked like a rummage
> sale. There was no discount. The clerk told me :"I guess it's not an
> important book."

... but, yeah, Biorders in particular is holoding on for dear life,
and if it WASN'T for teh coupons, I'd've never set foot in one again
after a clerk or manager or somesuch who's seen me drop some good
money even after discounts in his shop weekly followed me into the
men's room and harangued me about taking what were my OWN books in
there (and obviously so--on top was a 1st ed. of The Crying of Lot 49,
dust jacket and all, in clear plastic).  I browbeat him loudly all the
way to the door, and have never seen him again, so ...

> The inside flaps for the cover are sprayed pink, the kind of pink fade you
> find on remaindered books. Not all of them, mind you. Not all publishers use
> that signifier on a book headed for the $5 bin, but enough. If you've ever
> worked or obsessively shopped at one of the big box book stores, you'll know
> what I talking about.

Me, it wouldn't matter, in fact, I'd just as soon have an unusual
copy, but I'd certainly ask Penguin about taht, at very least ...

> I've always seriously wondered if Pynchon had it written into his contract
> that the first edition QP of Gravity's Rainbow be deliberately under-glued
> along the spine, thus guaranteeing that all copies of that edition would
> fall apart about two thirds the way in.

My 1st copy of AtD fell into two halves eventually, but that was after
carrying it EVERYWHERE all winter.  Ditto my 1st pbk. copy, with which
I finsihed up the group read (yes, it took THAT long).  But I did pack
away a pristine promo 1st ed. a friend gave me, so ...