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Inherent Vice
NY, Penguin Press, 2009. The advance reading copy, issued in very limited quantities to sales reps and reviewers. Book review editor's name and affiliation on title page, as is rumored to be the case on all copies, so that any pre-publication abuses could be traced. Light wear and crease to foredge of covers; thus near fine in wrappers. Extremely scarce; we have only handled one other copy, even though we have had the also-very-scarce advance issue of Against the Day multiple times. It's possible that this is the scarcer of the two, as it was treated almost more as a novelty -- Pynchon's take on the Hard-Boiled American Detective Novel -- rather than a full-fledged literary event, as his major novels tend to be. Basis for a Hollywood movie -- not surprisingly, the first of Pynchon's books to be adapted to the screen -- but it received mixed reviews: it's hard to imagine that a Pynchon book could ever be directly translated to film and be as coherent (if that's the right word) as the book. A contemporary rarity. [#032710] SOLD

All books are first printings of first editions or first American editions unless otherwise noted.

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