American · b. 1968
Rachel Kushner has been a finalist for the Booker Prize twice and the National Book Award twice. "The Flamethrowers" (2013) follows a young woman through 1970s New York and Italian radical politics; "The Mars Room" (2018) is set in a California women's prison. "Creation Lake" (2024) was shortlisted for the Booker. Kushner writes about politics and violence with novelistic intelligence; her research shows without slowing the story.