Why do people make video trailers for novels? They never really work, and this new one for Thomas Pynchon's Bleeding Edge is an especially sobering reminder of how ineffective they are. Pynchon—who narrated the trailer for his prevous novel, Inherent Vice—isn't a cinematic writer in the best of times (I consider that a strength), and he's also not a jerk-ass hipster—which makes this video of some guy wandering around his neighborhood in a "Hi, I'm Tom Pynchon" shirt all the more unappealing. Maybe it's for the best that Pynchon is so reclusive, since he's willing to put his name on stuff like this. Via Kottke.