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V (Paperback)

by Thomas Pynchon (Author)
4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
RRP: £8.99
Price: £6.73 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
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Other Editions: RRP: Our Price: Other Offers:
Hardcover £14.52 £14.52 5 used & new from £12.94
Paperback (1st Harper Perennial Modern Classics Ed) £8.75 £8.75 17 used & new from £5.38
Mass Market Paperback (Reissue) 5 used & new from £16.94
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Frequently Bought Together

V + Gravity's Rainbow + The Crying of Lot 49
Price For All Three: £18.99

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Product details

  • Paperback: 496 pages
  • Publisher: Vintage Classics; New edition edition (3 Jan 1998)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0099533316
  • ISBN-13: 978-0099533313
  • Product Dimensions: 19 x 13 x 3.4 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 40,055 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in this category:

    #6 in  Books > Fiction > Cult Authors > Pynchon, Thomas

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Product Description

Product Description

This is the first novel by the author of "Gravity's Rainbow", and a profoundly impressive and original work in its own right. The search for the mysterious V ranges from New York to Cairo to Alexandria to Malta. Apart from its strange heroine, the book's characters include sailors, spies, priests, philosophers, bums and bawds.


From the Publisher

A modern classic
'The book sails with majesty through caverns measureless to man. Few books haunt the waking or sleeping mind, but this is one' Time

The Quest for V. sweeps us through sixty years and a panorama of Alexandria, Paris, Malta, Florence, Africa and New York. But who, where or what is V.? Bawdy, sometimes sad and frequently hilarious, V has become a modern classic.

'A remarkable book' Sunday Telegraph

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What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

V
64% buy the item featured on this page:
V 4.5 out of 5 stars (11)
£6.73
Gravity's Rainbow
13% buy
Gravity's Rainbow 3.9 out of 5 stars (25)
£6.96
The Crying of Lot 49
9% buy
The Crying of Lot 49 3.6 out of 5 stars (14)
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Inherent Vice
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Customer Reviews

11 Reviews
5 star:
 (8)
4 star:
 (2)
3 star:    (0)
2 star:
 (1)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.5 out of 5 stars (11 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A brilliant, schizophrenic book., 22 April 2000
By A Customer
V is an unholy marriage between two different stories. Benny Profane is a beatnik who hangs around New York with a bunch of scoundrels called the Whole Sick Crew. Herbert Stencil is bent on proving that history has been driven by the letter V. The result of the combination is a book with more scope than you can imagine would fit into 450 pages. The book careens around the darkest and most colourful episodes of history by turns. Pynchon has his fingers in so many different pies that he manages to connect a huge spectrum of groups and experiences, and you're left with a jaw-droppingly global, if madcap, perspective, on what it means to be around in the second half of this century: 'Be cool, but care.'

Follow the participants in the V spree as they savour the thrills of Suck Hour in the Rusty Spoon, pursue alligators through labyrinthine New York sewers where a deranged Father once sought to convert rats to Christianity, and realise that a desert siege party is the worst of all places in which to attempt to monitor alien emissions...

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11 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Fine literary prose and incredible characterisation., 24 Feb 2004
This review is from: V (Mass Market Paperback)
If you look carefully on Amazon, you’ll find more books ABOUT the writings of Thomas Pynchon than you will BY Thomas Pynchon. He seems to be the writer of choice for critics, literary analysts and scholars alike. That aside, you cannot question the depth of this man’s writing talent, and V is a great example.

I think that many people who read this book will find it a chore, and eventually wont “get” the story. It twists and turns and at times goes off on tangents that dare to keep the readers attention. Sure, it’s hard going at times, but worth every word. The character development is unconventional, but thorough. The art of the scenes and the situations (and the whole sick crew!) is immaculate. As the story draws to a close the pieces fit together beautifully and create 20th century literary classic.

A companion to this book (as with all of TP books) is available, but treat the book as a separate item, and don’t taint it with over analysis.

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9 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best novels we have, 8 Nov 2006
By Father Thyme (San Francisco, USA) - See all my reviews
I can't add much to what's already been said about Pynchon. He is one of my three or four favorite living writers all of whom have something in common and all of whom, I guess, are about the same age == MICHAEL MOORCOCK (whose War Amongst the Angels books are no more 'sci fi' than Pynchon's), DON DELILLO (who is maybe the best of them overall) and J.G.BALLARD (whose latest books aren't 'sci fi' either). There is something about these writers' sensibility, their grasp on modern times, that makes them constantly rereadable. I couldn't tell you who was the best, but I could suggest you try reading them one after the other. If you do, you will wind up knowing more about our present day than when you started. If you're unfamiliar with these writers, I'd suggest you start with this one, then try Players by DeLillo, The Atrocity Exhibition by Ballard and Blood and The War Amongst the Angels by Moorcock. I don't think there's ever been a better time to be reading novels. V will prove it.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Always another level to be discovered...
If I have one thing to say about reading Thomas Pynchon, it's this: that by the time I finish reading one of his books, I'm sure that I'd understand more of it if I started now... Read more
Published 11 months ago by T. Gregory

5.0 out of 5 stars FORTY FOUR YEARS AGO
I've returned to V to so I can give a copy to an American friend who has never heard of Pynchon. Forty four years ago, I was introduced to Thomas Pynchon's V by a fellow Sandhurst... Read more
Published on 20 Jul 2007 by xerxes

2.0 out of 5 stars Please someone make it stop
From the first paragraph you know the type of person who will like this book. They've read Finnegan's Wake, they wear berets, they drive an electric eco-car. Read more
Published on 25 Jun 2007 by Caterkiller

5.0 out of 5 stars Good, maybe a classic!!
If you look carefully on Amazon, you’ll find more books ABOUT the writings of Thomas Pynchon than you will BY Thomas Pynchon. Read more
Published on 24 Feb 2004 by burri

5.0 out of 5 stars Twisty and turny but thoroughly fulfilly read.
If you look carefully on Amazon, you’ll find more books ABOUT the writings of Thomas Pynchon than you will BY Thomas Pynchon. Read more
Published on 24 Feb 2004 by burri

5.0 out of 5 stars Twists and turns and twists and turns.
I read Pynchon's "Mason & Dixon", and wanted to read more of this wonderful author's work. This is an incredible tale, stretching over thousands of miles and decades. Read more
Published on 16 Feb 2004 by burri

4.0 out of 5 stars A jigsaw puzzle of a book.
A very fine book which links together many people from many generations and questions coincidence or conspiracy. Read more
Published on 17 Sep 2001 by apatheticrich

5.0 out of 5 stars Good, all good.
Make your ablutions at the door of the temple which isn't a temple but an irreverent shack, a bivouac of twigs and dropped leaves put together unconsciously by the lost and... Read more
Published on 19 Jan 2001

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