Bleeding Edge
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Bleeding Edge is a novel by American author Thomas Pynchon, published by Penguin Press on September 17, 2013. The novel is a detective story, with its major themes being the September 11 attacks in New York City and the transformation of the world by the Internet.
Plot summary
The often surreal and dream-logic plot of the novel opens on the first day of spring 2001, with Maxine Tarnow walking her two sons to school before going to work.
Maxine, ex certified fraud examiner, is approached by Reg Despard regarding suspicious goings-on at hashslingrz, a computer security firm run by Gabriel Ice. She finds much of their financial numbers fail basic plausibility statistics, and notices large payments going to a now defunct website. She talks to an ex-temp for that site, learns they have strong Arab connections and move large sums of money through hawala, and notices she is being tailed afterwards.
She talks to Rocky Slagiatt, VC investor behind some of Gabriel's start-ups, who is nervous about where they may be going.
Mysterious government heavy Nicholas Windust puts pressure on Maxine, asking her to pump her Israeli brother-in-law for information regarding Mossad hacking methods.
Maxine's friend March Kelleher is suspicious about the activities of Gabriel Ice, her son-in-law, and asks Maxine to informally interview her daughter Tallis, Gabriel's wife. Tallis does admit to having concerns, but is unwilling to allow any auditing.
Rocky introduces Maxine to Igor Dashkov, who asks her about Madoff Securities. A quick scan reveals to Maxine that the numbers are obviously too good to be true.
Maxine pays a visit to Darklinear Solutions, another mystery vendor found associated with hashslingrz. She sees Tallis exiting the building, walking a bit; then someone else exiting, proceeding in the opposite direction, getting in a go-go mobile and picking up Tallis, so Maxine trails them.
Next morning, Maxine has an unexpected pre-dawn visit from Russian heavy Igor and March. Igor is very thankful, realizing he got out of Madoff Securities in time, and rewards her with illegally unhealthy ice cream. March and Maxine deliver some money to March's ex-husband, Sid, who takes them on his boat for a short drop off, but he is approached by patrol boats and races down the East River, only shaking off his pursuit when he reaches New Jersey near the landfill islands.
Maxine receives a videotape which directs her to a Montauk house that suspect Vip Epperdew is known to visit. Epperdew is involved with zapper fraud. Trying to find the exact house, a local informs her the house burned down a few weeks previously, and sneaks her into the mansion Gabriel Ice is building, where he has her help him steal vintage wines. She finds a mysterious code-locked door which she breaks into, leading to a baffling underground complex. The sudden appearance of a strange, short, human-like creature sends her into a panic and she flees in a hurry.
Maxine, in following the hashslingrz money, finds some of it is being diverted into Lester Traipse's account. She confronts him, and he is terrified, and intends to return the money, and asks Maxine to arrange terms. She agrees, but next day he is found dead, an apparent suicide. With the help of Conkling Speedwell, a man with a superhuman forensic sense of smell, she learns there is a peculiar mystery scent at the scene of Lester's death. This scent is identified as "9:30 Cologne", and is soon connected with Windust. The smell also horrifies a friend of Conkling's with a supernatural sense of "foresmell" who has been smelling not-yet-existent great fires in New York for some time now.
Maxine receives a videotape of men apparently rehearsing on the Deseret rooftop the shooting down of a jet plane using a Stinger missile.
Maxine attends a humongous dotcom-style-excess party, sponsored by Gabriel Ice on Saturday night, September 8. Everyone is partying like it's 1999. She finds Felix, a teenage programmer also involved with zapper fraud, but he won't say anything about Lester.
The following Tuesday, the 9/11 attacks occur. Ex-husband Horst had told Maxine the day before he was going to be working all night, and she now fears the worst. But he and his business partner had watched Monday Night Football and fell asleep, and next morning joined the masses seeking refuge in New Jersey, and was unable to get through. March, a blogger, leans towards low-level conspiracy theories (but nothing close to truther ideas).
Maxine takes Horst back. Eric and Driscoll, two programmers, move in with them as temporarily homeless. March finds herself hunted and homeless, but she keeps her blog up with WiFi. Gabriel breaks up with Tallis. Justin and Lucas, designers of the open-source program DeepArcher, find their work a home for numerous 9/11 ghosts. Maxine finds Windust's murdered body, and refuses to get involved. The Russians try a vircator attack on a Gabriel server farm.
The book ends with few resolutions. Maxine's children Otis and Ziggy display a level of maturity and independence that Maxine finds herself not quite ready for, as they walk to school alone.
