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A review by viiemzee
V. by Thomas Pynchon
4.0
It took me five whole months to read this book and I am so ashamed by that fact. But sometimes a book grabs you and you breeze through it. Other times, a book is gripping, but it’s too heavy to finish in a single sitting.
When I heard of this book the first time, it was in a class when a professor told us that this book had the best description of Valletta he had ever read. Surprised that a book written by an American featured Malta so heavily, I bought it and promised myself I would read it and fully enjoy it one day.
This book, first off, is heavy. I’m not talking only material and plot wise, I mean physically. This book is huge and weighs a ton, but damn if it isn’t a good read. But plot-wise, there is so much going on all the time that I was very confused at first until I learned who all the characters were. It was like watching Game of Thrones for the first time and struggling to remember who everyone was and their relation to each other.
Trying to explain this book simply is a bit of a struggle, but we can try, anyway.
The story takes place in America and Malta, but it actually also bounces between a lot of different locations in flashbacks. It follows a group of disillusioned individuals – some of them navy deserters, some of them artists trying too hard to be the next best things, and some of them deadbeats and prostitutes – who all meet and live together (in some capacity) in New York City. A common tie between some of them is the island of Malta, and one particular individual named Stencil is obsessed with ‘V’. Stencil’s only problem is that he doesn’t know if V is a person, a place, or an object, and he has dedicated his entire life to finding out. In Stencil’s eyes, finding out what V is will bring him one step closer to his father, who died in Malta in the 1919 riots.
The entire novel keeps you guessing up until the last second what, who, or where V actually is, and introduces you to a host of different characters with different connections that could all be V. And Pynchon really knows how to make characters memorable. Every single one of his characters, big and small, is given a brilliantly explained backstory and exposition, making them seem so lifelike even if they are just background characters who don’t contribute much. A small thing I really enjoyed was his ties to his other novel The Crying of Lot 49, with the brief mention of an industrious company that is a big part of The Crying.
I think one of my biggest qualms with Pynchon’s writing, and it comes out very clearly in this novel, is his long-winding sentences. Sometimes I get lost reading, and forget who’s talking and what they’re talking about, which is probably why it took me so long to finish the book.
Another thing that bothered but also pleased me slightly was his use of Maltese. Pynchon tries his very best to make Valletta as accurate as possible, and he really does try to include Maltese words and names into the whole thing, which really made me happy. I wish that the spelling of Maltese words had been more accurate, but then again it is a language that most of us Maltese aren’t sure how to spell either so I can’t fault him too much for that.
However, another positive point for this novel is that he does the whole idea of magical realism quite well. While it isn’t really outright said that there is an element of magical realism to the book, there is the sense that some things are being done in that vein. There is also the way that characters speak that lends to this idea, because the way that most characters speak makes it seem like they’re actually caricatures rather than real people. And I think that Pynchon is trying to make a pretty successful point here about how our idea of the American Dream, or really of life itself, is all a caricature and isn’t real. And these characters who are striving for just that have in turn become caricatures as they try to pursue something that doesn’t exist.
Did I enjoy this book, though? Yes. Immensely. I’m really glad I read it. Do I recommend that you’re in the right head space to read it? 100%. It’s heavy, and you might need to take breaks or even take notes while you’re reading it, but it’s so worth it in the end. I give it a 4/5, simply because the long-winding sentences really put me off while I was reading, but the story ties together beautifully in the end and I can’t fault him for that, or for depicting my homeland so accurately.
When I heard of this book the first time, it was in a class when a professor told us that this book had the best description of Valletta he had ever read. Surprised that a book written by an American featured Malta so heavily, I bought it and promised myself I would read it and fully enjoy it one day.
This book, first off, is heavy. I’m not talking only material and plot wise, I mean physically. This book is huge and weighs a ton, but damn if it isn’t a good read. But plot-wise, there is so much going on all the time that I was very confused at first until I learned who all the characters were. It was like watching Game of Thrones for the first time and struggling to remember who everyone was and their relation to each other.
Trying to explain this book simply is a bit of a struggle, but we can try, anyway.
The story takes place in America and Malta, but it actually also bounces between a lot of different locations in flashbacks. It follows a group of disillusioned individuals – some of them navy deserters, some of them artists trying too hard to be the next best things, and some of them deadbeats and prostitutes – who all meet and live together (in some capacity) in New York City. A common tie between some of them is the island of Malta, and one particular individual named Stencil is obsessed with ‘V’. Stencil’s only problem is that he doesn’t know if V is a person, a place, or an object, and he has dedicated his entire life to finding out. In Stencil’s eyes, finding out what V is will bring him one step closer to his father, who died in Malta in the 1919 riots.
The entire novel keeps you guessing up until the last second what, who, or where V actually is, and introduces you to a host of different characters with different connections that could all be V. And Pynchon really knows how to make characters memorable. Every single one of his characters, big and small, is given a brilliantly explained backstory and exposition, making them seem so lifelike even if they are just background characters who don’t contribute much. A small thing I really enjoyed was his ties to his other novel The Crying of Lot 49, with the brief mention of an industrious company that is a big part of The Crying.
I think one of my biggest qualms with Pynchon’s writing, and it comes out very clearly in this novel, is his long-winding sentences. Sometimes I get lost reading, and forget who’s talking and what they’re talking about, which is probably why it took me so long to finish the book.
Another thing that bothered but also pleased me slightly was his use of Maltese. Pynchon tries his very best to make Valletta as accurate as possible, and he really does try to include Maltese words and names into the whole thing, which really made me happy. I wish that the spelling of Maltese words had been more accurate, but then again it is a language that most of us Maltese aren’t sure how to spell either so I can’t fault him too much for that.
However, another positive point for this novel is that he does the whole idea of magical realism quite well. While it isn’t really outright said that there is an element of magical realism to the book, there is the sense that some things are being done in that vein. There is also the way that characters speak that lends to this idea, because the way that most characters speak makes it seem like they’re actually caricatures rather than real people. And I think that Pynchon is trying to make a pretty successful point here about how our idea of the American Dream, or really of life itself, is all a caricature and isn’t real. And these characters who are striving for just that have in turn become caricatures as they try to pursue something that doesn’t exist.
Did I enjoy this book, though? Yes. Immensely. I’m really glad I read it. Do I recommend that you’re in the right head space to read it? 100%. It’s heavy, and you might need to take breaks or even take notes while you’re reading it, but it’s so worth it in the end. I give it a 4/5, simply because the long-winding sentences really put me off while I was reading, but the story ties together beautifully in the end and I can’t fault him for that, or for depicting my homeland so accurately.