Cape secures Pynchon mystery
Victoria Gallagher writing in The Bookseller, Friday last.

Jonathan Cape has acquired a new book from celebrated American novelist Thomas Pynchon. Inherent Vice is the author's first mystery novel and publisher Dan Franklin said he expected it would bring Pynchon "legions of new readers".
Franklin bought UK and Commonwealth rights from Deborah Rogers at Rogers, Coleridge & White in a "significant" deal. It has been scheduled for release on 6th August.

Set in 1960s Los Angeles, the novel is described as "part noir, part psychedelic romp, all Thomas Pynchon". Private eye Doc Sportello meets up with an ex-girlfriend who is plotting to kidnap a billionaire, which draws Sportello into a "bizarre tangle" with a cast of characters said to include surfers, hustlers, rockers and a murderous loan-shark, as well as "an ex-con with a swastika tattoo and fondness for [actress/singer] Ethel Merman."
Franklin called the book as "a joy. It's brilliant on LA—specifically LA just after the Manson murders—and Pynchon's take on the old triumvirate of sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll is, as always, like no other writer's," he said.

Jonathan Cape has published all of Pynchon's novels, most recently Against the Day (2006), which was over 1,000 pages long and sold nearly 10,500 copies according to Nielsen BookScan.
Inherent Vice will be a more conventional length at just over 400 pages.

The title will be published on 4th August in the US through Penguin.