★ 06/17/2024

An undercover agent embeds with radical French environmentalists in this scintillating story of activism and espionage from Kushner (The Mars Room). Sadie Smith, a former FBI agent who lost her job after she was accused of entrapment, takes an assignment from unidentified contacts in the private sector. Her mission is to infiltrate the subversive commune Le Moulin, which is led by activist Pascal Balmy and is suspected of having destroyed a set of excavators at a reservoir construction site. Le Moulin’s ideas derive from their elderly mentor, Bruno Lacombe, who has spent the past 12 years living in caves. Bruno emerges from time to time to communicate with the group by email, but none of the characters see him in person. In Paris, Sadie seduces a filmmaker friend of Pascal’s to secure an introduction to him. Kushner intersperses Sadie’s tale with Bruno’s colorful claims, such as the alleged superiority of the Neanderthals (their square jaw was a “sunk cost”) and the existence of mythological creatures like Bigfoot (“We are not alone”). Eventually, Sadie learns of the group’s plans to protest a local fair, and she approaches the conclusion of her assignment with alarming amorality. Most of the narrative is dedicated to the activists’ philosophizing and Sadie’s gimlet-eyed observations, which Kushner magically weaves together (“People tell themselves, strenuously, that they believe in this or that political position,” Sadie muses. “But the deeper motivation for their rhetoric... is to shore up their own identity”). Readers will be captivated. Agent: Susan Golomb, Writers House. (Sept.)

One of the finest novelists working in the English language.” —Dwight Garner, The New York Times Book Review

“Like Bruno-the-philosopher, Kushner is a dazzling chronicler of end times.” —Maureen Corrigan, “Fresh Air”

“Kushner inhabits the spy’s perspective with such eerie finesse that you feel how much fun she’s having... the real covert operative here is Kushner, who’s never felt more cunning than in this novel... vital and profound.” —Ron Charles, The Washington Post

“A dazzling work of fiction: brisk, stylish, funny, moving, and unexpectedly, piercingly moral... At once terse and vivid, economical and expansive... true, funny, sad, shrewd, and beautifully controlled through each unyielding sentence.” —Anahid Neressian, The New York Review of Books

"The two-time National Book Award finalist has once again outdone herself... a flat-out page turner of a spy story, dotted with sex and booze, sarcasm and cynicism, and a heady dose of vital curiosity." —Michelle Kircher, San Francisco Chronicle

“What makes Kushner’s work irresistible is her brainy swagger.” —Leigh Haber, Boston Globe

“A profound and irresistible page-turner... The prose is thrilling, the ideas electrifying.” —The 2024 Booker Prize judges

“Kushner creates a spellbinding story of intrigue and subterfuge that examines the limits of control and moral influence.” —Lauren LeBlanc, Los Angeles Times

"A seductive, modish, spy thriller." —Keziah Weir, Vanity Fair

“Extraordinary... full of tension and clarity... riveting...” —Nicolás Medina Mora, The Nation

“Gripping... so fun.” —Laura Marsh, The New Republic

"Rich with secrets and dense with vibe, you could say that all of Kushner’s novels are spy novels, exposés from someone on the inside. So, what happens when she writes an actual spy novel? Everything you might expect—espionage, intrigue, heart-racing action sequences—and something you might not: an authentic ethical awakening.” —Lisa Locascio Nighthawk, Los Angeles Review of Books

"Coolly brilliant and suspenseful... Creation Lake is a class of fiction I have never before found so wonderfully seductive." —Alan Hollinghurst, The Guardian

“At last I get to say how deeply, madly, irrecoverably I loved Creation Lake... it was all stylish and cool and then somehow the book struck a blow to my heart.” —Louise Erdrich

“I was completely immersed and mesmerized. Creation Lake is a highly plotted fast-paced noir and yet full of ideas and depth. Rachel Kushner is the most exciting writer of her generation.” —Bret Easton Ellis

“Creation Lake reinvents the spy novel in one cool, erudite gesture. Only Rachel Kushner could weave environmental activism, paranoia, and nihilism into a gripping philosophical thriller. Enthralling and sleekly devious, this book is also a lyrical reflection on both the origin and the fate of our species. A novel this brilliant and profound shouldn’t be this much fun.” —Hernan Diaz

It's hard to imagine anyone other than Rachel Kushner narrating her gripping and highly original novel about an unconventional spy. Sadie is hired by governments and unnamed private entities to infiltrate radical eco and industrial terrorist groups. She is now in France, where she is blending into a group of potentially violent animal rights activists with a brewing plot against factory farms. Kushner's excellent narration gives Sadie's voice a sardonic yet intimate tone. Through Sadie, an American, Kushner describes the seedy underbelly of modern European society, one that tosses aside those who scramble to survive. This Europe, Kushner reminds us, is about as far from the glossy cosmopolitanism that tourists and the ultra-wealthy inhabit as it's possible to get. Masterful writing and narrating. D.G.L. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine

★ 2024-05-31
A woman infiltrates a cabal of French radicals. Will she go native?

The narrator of Kushner’s fourth novel goes by Sadie, though her real name—like much of her identity—is clouded in mystery. She works undercover to undermine environmental activists, formerly for the U.S. government, but since a case went sideways, she’s gone freelance. Now, she’s been commissioned by unnamed “contacts” to disrupt the Moulinards, a small farming cooperative in southwestern France protesting a government effort to construct a “megabasin” to support large-scale corporate farming. The Moulinards’ leader, Bruno, is an “anti-civver,” skeptical not just of capitalism but of the entire human species. (His writings—he exists largely in the form of email dispatches—argue that Neanderthals might have been better adapted for the planet.) Sadie has an arsenal of tools to monkey-wrench the monkey wrenchers—a willingness to exchange sex for access, a knack for languages and hacking, well-made cover stories, fake passports—but her work among the Moulinards stokes her own identity crisis. As she enters their world, she processes their enthusiasm, their philosophy (there are abundant references to critic Guy Debord), and their paranoia, which escalates as a national minister plans a visit to the region, upping the stakes. As if echoing Bruno’s concern, Sadie is such a slyly clever human that she’s undermining her own humanity. Sadie is similar to Kushner’s earlier fictional protagonists—astringent, thrill-seeking, serious, worldly—but here the author has tapped into a more melancholy, contemplative mode that weaves neatly around a spy story. Nobody would mistake it for a thriller, but Kushner has captured the internal crisis of ideology that spy yarns often ignore, while creating an engaging tale in its own right.

A deft, brainy take on the espionage novel.