...although that's still not very accessible. But this book is worth the trouble of grappling with the author's obscure allusions, open-ended questions, and maddening mixture of the deadly serious and the utterly nonsensical. Still, compared to his massive tomes GRAVITY'S RAINBOW and V., for instance, the general outline of CRYING OF LOT 49 is relatively comprehensible. Oedipa Maas, a confused child of the sixties, stumbles upon what may or may not be a centuries-old conpiracy as a result of being named "executrix" of her wealthy, eccentric former lover's estate. The sinister, fascinating glimpses of the "tristero" that increasingly obsess her may be genuine insights into a real but previously hidden reality, an indication of her descent into paranioa and madness, or a colossal practical joke. She has no way of determining which, and neither do we. On some levels this is frustrating, but Pynchon's hilarious, eccentric, beautiful prose and the original, fascinating plotline keep your interest, and certainly satisfied me, at least. His irreverant takes on the superficiality of both the counterculture and suburban America, the banality of bad Jacobean revenge melodramas, and the illogic of scientists, historians, and almost everyone else continue to delight me on rereadings. It may not be as great an achievement as his longer masterworks, but I would rather read this more enjoyable and accessible (although still profound and troubling) little book anyday.