A Penguin disponibilizou seu catálogo de lançamentos dos primeiros meses de 2009 e está lá “Inherent Vice”, o novo livro de Thomas Pynchon, um dos mais importantes escritores americanos. A sinopse diz:

“It’s been awhile since Doc Sportello has seen his ex-girlfriend. Suddenly out of nowhere she shows up with a story about a plot to kidnap a billionaire land developer whom she just happens to be in love with. Easy for her to say. It’s the tail end of the psychedelic sixties in L.A., and Doc knows that “love” is another of those words going around at the moment, like “trip” or “groovy,” except that this one usually leads to trouble. Despite which he soon finds himself drawn into a bizarre tangle of motives and passions whose cast of characters includes surfers, hustlers, dopers and rockers, a murderous loan shark, a tenor sax player working undercover, an ex-con with a swastika tattoo and a fondness for Ethel Merman, and a mysterious entity known as the Golden Fang, which may only be a tax dodge set up by some dentists.
In this lively yarn, Thomas Pynchon, working in an unaccustomed genre, provides a classic illustration of the principle that if you can remember the sixties, you weren’t there . . . or . . . if you were there, then you . . . or, wait, is it . . .”

Lá é possível ler também um trecho do livro:

“She came along the alley and up the back steps the way she always used to. Doc hadn’t seen her for over a year. Nobody had. Back then it was always sandals, bottom half of a flower-print bikini, faded Country Joe and the Fish T-shirt. Tonight she was all in flatland gear, hair a lot shorter than he remembered, looking just like she swore she’d never look.
“That you, Shasta? The packaging fooled me there for a minute.”
“Need your help, Doc.”
They stood in the streetlight through the kitchen window there’d never been much point putting curtains over and listened to the thumping of the surf from down the hill. Some nights, when the wind was right, you could hear the surf all over town.
Nobody was saying much. What was this? “So! You know I have an office now? Just like a day job and everything?”
“I looked in the phone book, almost went over there. But then I thought, better for everybody if this looks like a secret rendezvous.”
OK, nothing romantic tonight. Bummer. But it might be a paying gig. “Somebody’s keeping a close eye?”
“Just spent an hour on surface streets trying to make it look good.”
“How about a beer?” He went to the fridge, pulled two cans out of the case he kept inside, handed one to Shasta.”

Para o Brasil, a Companhia das Letras ainda está trabalhando na tradução de Against the Day, seu livro mais recente lançado.