Against the Day
Thomas Pynchon
 Nearly all reviewers of the book mention the Byzantine nature of the plot. Louis Menand in The New Yorker gives a simple description:The New Yorker Menand, Louis, "Do the Math: Thomas Pynchon's latest novel", The New Yorker, November 27, 2006 edition, posted November 20, accessed November 28, 2006 : "[T]his is the plot: An anarchist named Webb Traverse, who employs dynamite as a weapon against the mining and railroad interests out West, is killed by two gunmen, [...] who were hired by the wicked arch-plutocrat Scarsdale Vibe. Traverse's sons [...] set out to avenge their father’s murder. [...] Of course, there are a zillion other things going on in Against the Day, but the Traverse-family revenge drama is the only one that resembles a plot [...] that is, in Aristotle’s helpful definition, an action that has a beginning, a middle, and an end. The rest of the novel is shapeless [...]" As to the multitude of plot dead-ends, pauses and confusing episodes that return to continue much later in the narrative, Menand writes: : "[T]he text exceeds our ability to keep everything in our heads, to take it all in at once. There is too much going on among too many characters in too many places. [...] This [including tone shifts in which Pynchon spoofs various styles of popular literature] was all surely part of the intention, a simulation of the disorienting overload of modern culture."