The Flamethrowers

A Novel

Rachel Kushner

• Publisher: Scribner
• Year: 2013
• Topic: Literature
• eBook ISBN:
  9781439154175
• Subtopic: Literature General
• Index: Literature

* Selected as ONE of the BEST BOOKS of the 21st CENTURY by The New York Times * NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST * New York magazine’s #1 Book of the Year * Best Book of the Year by: The Wall Street Journal; Vogue; O, The Oprah Magazine; Los Angeles Times; The San Francisco Chronicle; The New Yorker; Time; Flavorwire; Salon; Slate; The Daily Beast

“Superb…Scintillatingly alive…A pure explosion of now.”—The New Yorker

Reno, so-called because of the place of her birth, comes to New York intent on turning her fascination with motorcycles and speed into art. Her arrival coincides with an explosion of activity—artists colonize a deserted and industrial SoHo, stage actions in the East Village, blur the line between life and art. Reno is submitted to a sentimental education of sorts—by dreamers, poseurs, and raconteurs in New York and by radicals in Italy, where she goes with her lover to meet his estranged and formidable family. Ardent, vulnerable, and bold, Reno is a fiercely memorable observer, superbly realized by Rachel Kushner.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Dedication
• Epigraph
• Chapter 1: He Killed Him with a Motorbike Headlamp (What He had in His Hand).
• Chapter 2: Spiritual America
• Chapter 3: He had Come a Long Way to that Moment of Quick Violence,
• Chapter 4: Blanks
• Chapter 5: Valera is Dead
• Chapter 6: Imitation of Life
• Chapter 7: The Little Slave Girl
• Chapter 8: Lights
• Chapter 9: It Was Milk
• Chapter 10: Faces
• Chapter 11: The Way We Were
• Chapter 12: The Sears Mannequin Standard
• Chapter 13: The Trembling of the Leaves
• Chapter 14: The Rules of Violence
• Chapter 15: The March on Rome
• Chapter 16: Hookers and Children
• Chapter 17: Match My Mood: The Life of Ronnie Fontaine
• Chapter 18: Behind the Green Door
• Chapter 19: The Day Rome Was Founded, April 21
• Chapter 20: Her Velocity
• A Portfolio Curated
• Photographs
• Acknowledgments
• ‘The Hard Crowd’ Teaser
• About Rachel Kushner
• Copyright