4 of 11 copies available
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2024 BOOKER PRIZE*
*LONGLISTED FOR THE 2024 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD*
*LONGLISTED FOR THE 2025 PEN FAULKNER AWARD FOR FICTION*
*AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER*
*NAMED A BEST BOOK OF 2024 BY THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE ATLANTIC, VULTURE, VOGUE, THE WASHINGTON POST, KIRKUS REVIEWS, NPR, THE ECONOMIST, THE CHICAGO PUBLIC LIBRARY, VOX, and more*
From Rachel Kushner, two-time finalist for both the Booker Prize and National Book Award, a "vital" (The Washington Post) and "wickedly entertaining" (The Guardian) novel about a seductive and cunning American woman who infiltrates an anarchist collective in France—a propulsive page-turner filled with dark humor.
Creation Lake is a novel about a secret agent, a thirty-four-year-old American woman of ruthless tactics and clean beauty who is sent to do dirty work in France. "Sadie Smith" is how the narrator introduces herself to the rural commune of French subversives on whom she is keeping tabs, and to her lover, Lucien, a young and well-born Parisian she has met by "cold bump"—making him believe the encounter was accidental. Like everyone she targets, Lucien is useful to her and used by her. Sadie operates by strategy and dissimulation, based on what her "contacts"—shadowy figures in business and government—instruct. First, these contacts want her to incite provocation. Then they want more.
In this region of old farms and prehistoric caves, Sadie becomes entranced by a mysterious figure named Bruno Lacombe, a mentor to the young activists who believes that the path to emancipation is not revolt but a return to the ancient past. Just as Sadie is certain she's the seductress and puppet master of those she surveils, Bruno is seducing her with his ingenious counter-histories, his artful laments, his own tragic story.
Written in short, vaulting sections, Rachel Kushner's rendition of "noir" is taut and dazzling. Creation Lake is Kushner's finest achievement yet—a work of high art, high comedy, and unforgettable pleasure.
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Release date
September 3, 2024 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9781797183473
- File size: 321803 KB
- Duration: 11:10:25
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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Starred review from June 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. -
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 -
December 6, 2024
Kushner follows her novel about incarcerated women, The Mars Room, with the story of an acerbic secret agent. Thirty-four-year-old Sadie Smith (an alias) doesn't technically work for any government since a successful entrapment defense hamstrung her last assignment with federal contacts. Even so, she is tasked with infiltrating a French anarchist collective, employing her indisputable facility with subterfuge, her flexible moral compass, and her keen insight in the process. Sadie spies on emails from activist Bruno Lacombe, searching for hints of the group's plans while being unconsciously affected by his empathetic, eloquent musing on the region's history of persecution and his childhood during World War II. Her sense of connection to Lacombe subverts her motivation even as she aims to subvert the leftists he's writing to, but Sadie's shadowy employers demand results, creating a tension that grips listeners to the end. Sadie matches her sharp observations with cutting judgment that Kushner, who also narrates the audiobook, delivers in wry Californian upspeak, befitting a displaced American in rural France. With unhurried clarity, Kushner renders her descriptive prose accessible while evoking her protagonist's disdainful lack of urgency. VERDICT An irresistibly unlikeable protagonist and lush prose recommend this literary neo-noir for most libraries.--Lauren Kage
Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
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