voting to date , Polls close midnight May 20

[Robin Landseadel]

The reason why I'm crazy for Farewell My Lovely—crap or not—are all  
the allusions, b-movie dialog and local colors of a pre-Pynchon L.A.  
There are so many echos of Inherent Vice in Chandler's little thriller  
and the dope scenes are every bit as good.
On May 19, 2010, at 5:28 AM, John Bailey wrote:

> Also: can I be annoying and make a brief campaign speech?
>
> We here at the P-List have never been that big on straight-up
> book-club analysis - why did this character choose to do that thing?
> What are the themes of this book? What is the author trying to say?
>
> But this hive mind is a frickin' ripper at locating extra-textual
> references, resonances, historical sources, literary allusions,
> off-the-wall speculation and on-the-money jokes. This kind of stuff is
> what makes the list so enjoyable for someone reading Pynchon but I
> think things would get pretty quiet if we read a novel that doesn't
> lend itself to any of this. Partly why I was against a group read of
> 2666 (or Kavalier and Clay) - they're big and pretty readable but I
> they're not thick with things that need discussion.
>
> I think most of the contenders on the list below probably are, on the
> other hand, but maybe something to keep in mind.