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Nothing Special

Book
Nothing Special
Our Rating: (4.5/5)
Author: Flattery, Nicole
Category: Fiction & related items
Publisher: Bloomsbury
ISBN: 9781526612137
RRP: 29.99

Synopsis

A 2023 HIGHLIGHT FOR- THE TIMES * TELGRAPH * STYLIST * GQ * GUARDIAN * HARPER’S BAZAAR * GOOD HOUSEKEEPING * WATERSTONES * i-D * IRISH TIMES * HUFFINGTON POST UK
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I truly love Nicole Flattery’s writing’ SALLY ROONEY

In enviably elegant prose, she manages to be both arch and deadly serious’ LOUISE KENNEDY
‘A wry, witty and wonderful novel from a brilliantly captivating storyteller’ JOSEPH O’CONNOR
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A wildly original debut novel about two young women navigating the complex worlds of Andy Warhol’s Factory, and coming of age in 1960s New York
New York City, 1966. Seventeen-year-old Mae lives in a run-down apartment with her alcoholic mother and her mother’s sometimes-boyfriend, Mikey. She is turned off by the petty girls at her high school, and the sleazy men she typically meets. When she drops out, she is presented with a job offer that will remake her world entirely- she is hired as a typist for the artist Andy Warhol.
Warhol is composing an unconventional novel by recording the conversations and experiences of his many famous and alluring friends. Tasked with transcribing these tapes alongside several other girls, Mae quickly befriends Shelley and the two of them embark on a surreal adventure at the fringes of the countercultural movement. Going to parties together, exploring their womanhood and sexuality, this should be the most enlivening experience of Mae’s life. But as she grows increasingly obsessed with the tapes and numb to her own reality, Mae must grapple with the thin line between art and voyeurism and determine how she can remain her own person as the tide of the sixties sweeps over her.
Nothing Special is a whip-smart coming-of-age story about friendship, independence and the construction of art and identity, bringing to life the experience of young women in this iconic and turbulent moment.
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PRAISE FOR SHOW THEM A GOOD TIME-


‘A masterclass . . . Bold, irreverent and agonisingly funny’ Sally Rooney
Announces the arrival of a brilliant talent’ Financial Times
Explores difficult questions about self-worth, agency and intimacy with thrilling sharpness’ Sunday Times
‘Demands repeated reading’ Jon McGregor

Nicole Flattery is the author of Show Them a Good Time. Her work has been published in the Stinging Fly, White Review, Dublin Review, Irish Times and Winter Papers, among others. She contributed a story to Faber’s 2019 Anthology of New Irish Writing, and her story ‘Track’ won the 2017 White Review Short Story Prize. A graduate of the master’s program in Creative Writing at Trinity College, Dublin, she lives in Galway.

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