The Ace of Spades Book Club

Bruce wrote, "I thought you were going to start an AoShq book club and we were going to read and discuss The Crying of Lot 49."

Well, I thought I said Moby Dick, but sure, i can (re-) read Crying of Lot 49. It's a good one. It's also very short.

I mean, it's one of those books where when they give you a choice of what books you can do a paper on, you immediately go "Oh this one looks mighty promising, mighty promising indeed" when you see it has like 225 pages. (Correction: 192 pages. It's barely a book. It's just a TV Guide article with some subplots.)

It's Thomas Pynchon's most accessible work, but uses a lot of the tropes he's famous for in his hard-to-get-through opuses like Gravity's Rainbow. So you basically get to say "Oh sure, I know Pynchon's work" without having to read an 800 page mammoth.

It's about a worldwide conspiracy dating back to the Elizabethan era involving the ___ ______. I shouldn't say. Don't say in the comments. Keep it spoiler free.*

Anyway, if you're interested, let's say we'll shoot for next Friday late afternoon to discuss it. (Believe me, you can knock it off in 2-3 nights. It's a breeze.)

And then we'll figure out when we can settle in for the real slog, Moby Dick.

* One thing I will say, to encourage people who are reluctant, is that the book hits a couple of themes that Lovecraft did. Oh, it's not a horror novel, don't get me wrong, but if you know Lovecraft and The King in Yellow you'll see some echoes of that idea in Lot 49.

posted by Ace at 04:47 PM

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