Difference between revisions of "Shadow Ticket Reviews"
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Please add any relevant reviews as they come in. Blog reviews are fine as long as they're substantial and more than a few paragraphs. | Please add any relevant reviews as they come in. Blog reviews are fine as long as they're substantial and more than a few paragraphs. | ||
| − | '''10/ | + | '''10/07/25''' [https://unherd.com/2025/10/thomas-pynchons-world-of-shadows/ ''Unherd''] - '''Thomas Pynchon’s world of shadows''' - William T. Vollmann: "The bottom line is that Hicks McTaggart’s Milwaukee is hopelessly far away. Fortunately, when hailed by Stuffy Keegan’s submarine he was informed, maybe even guaranteed, that thanks to some “swell beer joints”, the home base of Fiume (AKA Rijeka) is “the Milwaukee of the Adriatic”. Anything can happen in one Milwaukee or another, maybe even something good, for even “as Hicks begins to understand that he’s not going back to the States right away”, Pynchon gives him one lulu of a ticket, because his ever closer friend Terike starts teaching him Hungarian, which necessarily involves kissing lessons. [https://unherd.com/2025/10/thomas-pynchons-world-of-shadows/ Full Review »] |
| + | '''10/06/25''' [https://lit.newcity.com/2025/10/06/a-golden-ratio-taking-the-measure-of-thomas-pynchons-shadow-ticket/ ''Newcity''] – '''A Golden Ratio: Taking the Measure of Thomas Pynchon's ''Shadow Ticket''''' - Annette Lepique: "I don’t want to spoil any more of the book, so please trust me when I say this book is a gift from one of America’s last remaining men of letters. Also, for us Chicago and Milwaukee readers, “Shadow” is not only a madcap and moving inter-war caper of the supernatural variety, but an unexpected shoutout to a corner of our region’s history. Though only around a third of the book takes place around the Great Lakes, it is just plain fun to recognize some of the places within “Shadow”’s pages. Pynchon has the uncanny gift of transforming the places that you may know into a grand adventure: like the seedy after-hours goings-on at the Green Mill, or Daphne’s teenage flight to freedom from a defunct Winnetka sanatorium, or even still the ritzy beginnings of the still-ritzy Plaza del Lago, a first-of-its-kind outdoor shopping center. [https://lit.newcity.com/2025/10/06/a-golden-ratio-taking-the-measure-of-thomas-pynchons-shadow-ticket/ Full Review »] | ||
'''09/30/25''' [https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/articles/thomas-pynchons-shadow-ticket-1930s-100000281.html ''L.A. Times''] - '''Thomas Pynchon's ''Shadow Ticket'' is a 1930s detective tale with a sucker punch ending''' - David Kipen: "For most of the way, though, ''Shadow Ticket'' may remind you of an exceptionally tight tribute band, playing the oldies so lovingly that you might as well be listening to your old, long-since-unloaded vinyl. The catch is, for an encore — just when you could swear the band might actually be improving on the original — the musicians turn around and blow you away with a lost song that nobody’s ever heard before."[https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/articles/thomas-pynchons-shadow-ticket-1930s-100000281.html Full review »] | '''09/30/25''' [https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/articles/thomas-pynchons-shadow-ticket-1930s-100000281.html ''L.A. Times''] - '''Thomas Pynchon's ''Shadow Ticket'' is a 1930s detective tale with a sucker punch ending''' - David Kipen: "For most of the way, though, ''Shadow Ticket'' may remind you of an exceptionally tight tribute band, playing the oldies so lovingly that you might as well be listening to your old, long-since-unloaded vinyl. The catch is, for an encore — just when you could swear the band might actually be improving on the original — the musicians turn around and blow you away with a lost song that nobody’s ever heard before."[https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/articles/thomas-pynchons-shadow-ticket-1930s-100000281.html Full review »] | ||
Revision as of 10:08, 7 October 2025
Review aggregators
Reviews
Please add any relevant reviews as they come in. Blog reviews are fine as long as they're substantial and more than a few paragraphs.
10/07/25 Unherd - Thomas Pynchon’s world of shadows - William T. Vollmann: "The bottom line is that Hicks McTaggart’s Milwaukee is hopelessly far away. Fortunately, when hailed by Stuffy Keegan’s submarine he was informed, maybe even guaranteed, that thanks to some “swell beer joints”, the home base of Fiume (AKA Rijeka) is “the Milwaukee of the Adriatic”. Anything can happen in one Milwaukee or another, maybe even something good, for even “as Hicks begins to understand that he’s not going back to the States right away”, Pynchon gives him one lulu of a ticket, because his ever closer friend Terike starts teaching him Hungarian, which necessarily involves kissing lessons. Full Review »
10/06/25 Newcity – A Golden Ratio: Taking the Measure of Thomas Pynchon's Shadow Ticket - Annette Lepique: "I don’t want to spoil any more of the book, so please trust me when I say this book is a gift from one of America’s last remaining men of letters. Also, for us Chicago and Milwaukee readers, “Shadow” is not only a madcap and moving inter-war caper of the supernatural variety, but an unexpected shoutout to a corner of our region’s history. Though only around a third of the book takes place around the Great Lakes, it is just plain fun to recognize some of the places within “Shadow”’s pages. Pynchon has the uncanny gift of transforming the places that you may know into a grand adventure: like the seedy after-hours goings-on at the Green Mill, or Daphne’s teenage flight to freedom from a defunct Winnetka sanatorium, or even still the ritzy beginnings of the still-ritzy Plaza del Lago, a first-of-its-kind outdoor shopping center. Full Review »
09/30/25 L.A. Times - Thomas Pynchon's Shadow Ticket is a 1930s detective tale with a sucker punch ending - David Kipen: "For most of the way, though, Shadow Ticket may remind you of an exceptionally tight tribute band, playing the oldies so lovingly that you might as well be listening to your old, long-since-unloaded vinyl. The catch is, for an encore — just when you could swear the band might actually be improving on the original — the musicians turn around and blow you away with a lost song that nobody’s ever heard before."Full review »
09/22/25 The New Yorker - Reading the New Pynchon Novel in a Pynchonesque America - Kathryn Schulz: "Is this act of riding off into the sunset ironic, a comment, as with “Mason & Dixon,” on the evils committed in America by the allure of westward expansion? Or is it what Hicks should have done many plot twists ago—escape the forces scheming to control him by running away with the woman he loves? Or is it just Pynchon turning around in the saddle to wave farewell? Who knows. The ticket, the shadow ticket, “Shadow Ticket”: all these remain unresolved, leaving us with the enduring hope of the Pynchon universe, that everything in it means something. At some point, though, meaning that is sufficiently cryptic becomes indistinguishable from no meaning at all." Full article »
09/22/25 The Times - Thomas Pynchon — our verdict on his first novel in over a decade - Mark Sanderson: "Pynchon’s fans will be delighted to make the acquaintance of such zany-monickered characters as Special Agent TP O’Grizbee, the female hack Glow Tripforth del Vasto and the “noted apportist” Dr Zoltan von Kiss. Others may not get beyond the first dozen pages. If he wants to, Pynchon, wired with research rapture, can take you far beyond boredom. Here, the tedium is the message. On the other hand, no one else fuses quantum physics and literary allusion (Shakespeare, Joyce, Borges, Conrad, Burroughs, Dickinson and Rilke) like he does. In his world, as on the web that did not exist in 1973, everything and nothing is connected." Full article »
