Ah, I really don't know what to make of this one. Not only do I feel I don't know enough about the right things to fully understand what Rachel Kushner is doing here (felt the same way about The Flamethrowers, though not The Mars Room), I also find myself agreeing with a lot of both Dwight Garner's glowing NYT review and Brandon Taylor's scathing LRB review. So, Creation Lake is about an American spy called Sadie who infiltrates a French eco-commune and becomes weirdly seduced by the philosophy of one of the activists' mentors, Bruno, who believes that Neanderthals were better adapted than Homo sapiens to live in harmony with nature, and that modern humans won out not because they were smarter but because they were more competitive. The activists find Bruno's point of view increasingly detached from the real world, whereas he thinks their protests against corporate farming are just tinkering around the edges. One thing I definitely agree with Taylor on is that the 'scrambling of the timeline' in the first third, possibly even the first half, of this novel, makes an already deliberately brainy story unnecessarily complicated. On the other hand, when things finally get going around the midpoint, I found myself more in harmony with Kushner's intentions. Sadie is a great character; I read her as a deliberate portrait of somebody who is utterly self-centred, and who has done horrible things to people during her time undercover, but at the same time seems to vastly over-estimate her own importance and impact. It makes sense that she makes the political ideas discussed in Creation Lake ultimately all about her.

I also struggled with how to read the way Kushner writes the eco-commune. In some ways, she falls disappointingly into cliche, refusing to engage with the actual ideas put forward by the group and just sniping at the way they reproduce patriarchal divisions of labour and don't take care of their children properly. I found myself wondering if she actually agrees with Sadie that 'there are no politics inside of people... People might claim to believe in this or that, but in the four am version of themselves, most possess no fixed idea on how society should be organised'. Eleanor Catton's handling of the micropolitics of this kind of guerrilla movement in Birnam Wood is far more interesting. Taylor, again, skewers the issue nicely when he writes 'Why deal with the content of someone’s politics and activism when you can accuse them of being middle class?' On the other hand, though, I did think that Kushner was up to something more here than just the usual Communes Are Bad novel. Again, I think Creation Lake could have got on with it a bit more quickly, but by the end, Sadie's original beliefs are shattering. Honestly, I'd probably have to re-read this to fully grasp it, but it's an exciting, slippery addition to the Booker longlist.

An odd book, but I rather liked it. ‘Sadie Smith‘ is a spy sent in to infiltrate a group of French provocateurs. Their shady leader, Bruno, sends emails to the group which Sadie becomes fascinated by. These emails are rather an excuse for the author to expound on topics such as pre-history, anthropology and philosophy but weirdly I didn‘t feel talked down to, unlike The Alternatives. It kept me hooked all the way through, until the rather disappointing ending. (What is it with book endings at the moment?!)

3.5 stars rounded up to 4

I found this thought-provoking, funny, chilling, and so engagingly written that, while I noted its length, and how slowly I was reading it, I never resented it. Perhaps it helped to know that area of France a bit, and be able to indulge in sense memories of that gorgeous region as I read.

My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

rich with theory and thought provoking ideas, the attention to detail in Kushner’s writing is admirable. Although i did personally struggle to get stuck into this book, i have no doubts that many others would appreciate this work.

Rachel Kushner can sure write but I have to grok this book as there's so much food for thought that I have to reflect.
My only note is that the abundance of themes and reflection killed the story as it made it very slow
I will be back with a more proper review
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine

3.5 stars

This is the book from the Booker Prize shortlist that grabbed my attention the most, so I wasn't really sure what to expect and I think I'm still trying to work out my thoughts! At the heart of the story is 'Sadie' who has been sacked from her job in the US and is now hired to infiltrate eco-activists in Europe, which is no easy task as they are ultra wary due to previous encounters with outsiders.

So she uses her feminine ways to find a way in, and we get to see the build up to an 'event' they have planned, although for me this often took a backseat to the 'neanderthal' chatter that ran throughout the book which came from the eco group muse 'Bruno'. She reads his emails and finds herself struck by his thoughts on those from the past, compared to human beings of now and this did prove to be quite fascinating.

A lot of the book is taken over by the rambling thoughts of Sadie, as she never seemed to pause for breath! She had an opinion on everything, and while there were other characters around her we never really got to learn more about them and their motive for being part of the commune/eco group, and I did find the story getting a bit bogged down in the middle with not really going anywhere. But it still made for an intriguing read.

I enjoyed the writing about Neanderthals and the reflections on civilisation/capitalism/climate but the glacial plot meant this didn't really work as a novel for me. I get that the narrator is supposed to be an unappealing character but the digressive style meant it was a bit like listening to your drunk uncle moaning about the horrors of a recent foreign holiday. Commentary on everything from the overselling of Italian wine to the culinary offer in French service stations to the willingness or otherwise of children to eat ice-cream cones just left me cold.

This is definitely not a taut literary thriller, though it has some thought-provoking ideas which will appeal to readers who like challenging literary fiction.

‘Sadie Smith’ is the American girlfriend of Lucien Dubois, who in turn is a longtime friend of Pascal Balmy, leader of the Le Moulin commune in the French countryside—and suspected eco-terrorist. In reality, she’s an undercover operative hired by a private party to find proof of the group’s sabotage (or to nudge them into doing so, if necessary). Quick to judge, acerbic in her assessments, Sadie is sharp, cynical, pragmatic: “You people are not real to me. No one is.” When her job here is done, she’ll vanish, leaving Lucien to mourn a love that never existed.

Interspersed with her operation are the emails of Bruno Lacombe, a quasi-religious figure to the Moulinards, which range from digressions on Neanderthal culture to French history to the spiritual effects of true darkness. A cave-dwelling recluse whose life has been dogged by death, at first his emails are nothing more than a chance at insight into the group’s guiding philosophy (and whether they can be manipulated into taking violent action). But as Sadie spends more time in the rural Guyenne, she finds herself drawn to these missives and their reassessments of human nature.

One early review called this book Kill Bill if written by Le Carré. This is neither a revenge story, nor necessarily stylish. Rachel Kushner underlines the grime and doubt and ruthlessness of this private-style espionage, untethered to even the pretence of moral values. Her taut prose and pitched-down voice do occasionally drift into repetition, but there’s always an image or an insight to keep this story from falling into tedium or predictability. Some repetition has a purpose—I’m dancing around the details, because they do deserve to be experienced first-hand. This also isn’t to say there’s no glimmer of hope. A seam of humanism runs through the book, exemplified in Bruno, always present, never seen. Kushner’s world of lies and the wider forces which enable its existence are a dirty business; there is (Bruno says, she says) another way to live and to be. This is about as optimistic a message as Sadie could hope for, under the circumstances.

Thanks to NetGalley for the ARC.

Rachel Kushner’s Creation Lake offers a thrilling yet introspective journey into the life of Sadie Smith, a freelance undercover agent with a questionable backstory. As Sadie navigates a high-stakes mission in France, the novel blends espionage, deception, and sharp psychological insight. Sadie is far from the typical spy, using her linguistic prowess and internet hacking skills to infiltrate her target, all while grappling with the philosophical implications of Neanderthal-like traits found in her hacked emails.

Sadie Smith, the book’s main protagonist and narrator, is a freelance undercover agent operating under this pseudonym. Although the reader is told her backstory, as far as her work contacts know, she comes from a place in California which in fact has no inhabitants. From the outset, this had me wondering how much of her narrative is reliable, even when she seems to be taking the reader into confidence.

Leaving aside the question of her reliability, Sadie has a thrilling story to tell as she works in France on a politically and ecologically sensitive assignment for an unnamed client involving espionage, deception, seduction, and expert internet skills, such as hacking into emails. It helps that she is physically attractive, rich, a gifted linguist, and is adept at “reading” people. As the novel progresses, the reader learns the content of many of the hacked emails which compare the attributes of Neanderthal people to those of contemporary humans, and which influence Sadie’s actions probably more than she realises. The limestone scenery of this part of France is perfectly depicted.

Although my interest flagged a little about two thirds of the way through the novel, I was already enough invested in the outcome of Sadie’s assignment to continue with its increasingly thrilling progress, and its completion did not disappoint. But where this actually left Sadie emotionally and psychologically is left for the reader to decide. Four and a half stars, rounded to five.

A bizarre novel about a spy Sadie, who infiltrates a group of radical hippes. This however is nothing like Ian Fleming, instead we get long periods of internal thoughts, insight about Neanderthals, the Cagots, Polynesian sailors. This is a book examining the alternative ways of life and how the knowledge these people obtain is discredited, it is a book about power and control. Very interesting and thought provoking, Sadie, Lucien and Bruno were interesting characters well drawn, the remaining characters were not so, minimal effort was made with the plot and the book was far too long for its content. Really enjoyed this one, but it is a long way from perfect.

Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner is an ambitious and inventive, propulsive and thought-provoking read.

‘Sadie Smith’ is a hot spy. She’ll remind you that she’s hot don’t worry! This has gotta be satire of men writing women and ya know, breasted boobily.

Anyway! Sadie has been struck off by the government so instead is employed by private organisations. For this job she has to infiltrate a group of alleged eco terrorists in the south of France & convince them into violent action.

It all sounds like a great premise! Unfortunately I found it altogether quite dull. There are so many tangents usually spurred on by Sadie reading emails from a man affiliated with the group, Bruno. He is obsessed with Neanderthals and early man, which Sadie soon finds herself very intrigued by. I was not intrigued.

At over 400 pages I did slog through this. It was funny in parts! It was a little thrilling in parts! And I wish those parts were leant into more. A miss for me unfortunately.

Having previously read The Mars Room and really struggling with it, I was keen to give Kushner's work another go. But sadly, after reading Creation Lake, I think that her work is just not for me. I struggled again to get into this book and found that the story dragged and was all over the place in parts. I was just left feeling confused by the end.

Although I think this book itself is very interesting and well crafted, with a lot of intrigue, drama and well-rendered characters, I was somewhat let down by the end of the book, which I feel was an abandonment of its core arguments and narrative, and it left me a little short-changed, even though I think so much of the book is very well done.

I received an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

An intelligent, carefully-crafted play on an existential thriller partly inspired by Rachel Kushner’s fascination with leftwing, French crime writer Jean-Patrick Manchette. Set in 2013, Kushner’s narrative centres on an agent provocateur known, for now, as Sadie Smith. Ignominiously fired from her job as a covert operative for internal American intelligence, Sadie’s currently selling her services to the highest bidder. All we really know about Sadie is she’s 34, fluent in several European languages, and once embarked on a doctorate in rhetoric. The perfect background for her current assignment working for a shadowy grouping of powerful, monied figures. Sadie’s journey begins in Paris where she presents as the stereotypical, wide-eyed American abroad, rather like Sally in <i>The Dud Avocado;</i> but it’s a ruse that provides access to her targets through a complex process of seduction and infiltration.
Sadie’s expertise lies in environmental activism, what her employers would label eco-terrorism. She’s been charged to gain access to a communal farm overseen by faded politico Pascal Balmy who’s suspected of orchestrating a series of attacks on French infrastructure: forms of industrial sabotage intended to disrupt the forward march of agribusiness. During background surveillance, Sadie manages to hack Pascal’s email accounts, monitoring his contact with Bruno Lacombe a philosopher/anthropologist who’s retreated from the world, installing himself in a cave on his property close to Pascal’s group in southern France. Pascal and Bruno are both broadly anti-capitalist, direct descendants of the radicalism of May ’68. But while Pascal remains convinced that capitalism can be fought from within, building on the situationist ideals of Guy Debord, Bruno’s drawn to a kind of anarcho-primitivism, anti-civilisation stance. He’s become obsessed with the paths not taken: prehistory and the culture of the Neanderthals, a “world before the fall, before class and domination.” For Bruno disrupting capitalism is no longer the answer, what’s needed is a shift in consciousness, to think beyond and outside it.

Although it’s effective read purely as a slightly-satirical variation on a conventional spy story, Kushner’s novel works well as a loose companion piece to her earlier <i>The Flamethrowers:</i> where that examined Italian leftist politics in the seventies, this could be interpreted as an exploration of what came next. Kushner’s piece is impressively researched. She expertly interweaves fact and fiction indirectly referencing: Deleuze’s nomadism; key political texts like <i>The Coming Insurrection, </i> infamous journal <i>Tiqqun;</i>and elements of French social and political history from the climate change activism that led to the formation of Les Soulèvements de la Terre (Earth Uprising) to the fight for Larzac and the Tarnac Nine; violent police tactics and growing clashes over megabasin projects in rural France. Many of her fictional characters have real-life counterparts: Bruno parallels aspects of philosopher Bruno Latour; hapless politician Platon is a version of the controversial Manuel Valls; a prominent French novelist Michel Thomas conjures provocative author Michel Houellebecq. Thomas’s cameo also establishes a link to Houellebecq’s <i>Serotonin</i> which Kushner’s story sometimes overlaps.

Sadie’s an intriguing creation, world weary and cynical, she views the world as chaotic and ultimately lawless – she sometimes reminded me of Musil’s man without qualities. Like Reno in <i>The Flamethrowers</i> she often appears less engaged in action than in representing and interpreting everything around her. And like Reno years before, she soon realises women in far-left circles are routinely relegated to the periphery, the women of Pascal’s commune are mostly assigned to childcare and serving coffee. A situation that suits Sadie’s agenda, making her far less likely to be fingered as a potential saboteur. Although Sadie’s experiences will take her in a wholly unexpected direction, one which elegantly solves the mystery of Kushner’s ongoing juxtaposition of Bruno’s musings and Sadie’s activities. Although this may prove a little too dry for some readers, and I don't entirely agree with Kushner's underlying arguments, I found it surprisingly absorbing, inventive and insightful.

I absolutely devoured this book! It took me a couple of chapters to get into it but once I did I couldn't put it down. It wasn't only the plot that kept me turning the pages but the discussions on early humans, what it means to be human, society under late-capitalism, and imagining a world post capitalism. Rachel Kushner's writing is hypnotic, I've never read anything quite like Creation Lake, it was masterfully done. If you're on the fence about picking up Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner, I'd highly recommend giving it a go, I'm so glad I read this excellent novel.

As of August 2024, Rachel Kusher has made the Booker longlist for her new novel, "Creation Lake." Kushner's work tells the story of a spy named Sadie (her code name rather than her real name) who must infiltrate a potential eco-terrorist organisation in France. From the beginning, we know that she is a shape shifter who takes on a new identity with every assignment. She becomes obsessed with the philosophy and emails of Bruno Lacombe--the man who serves as a confidante/inspiration for certain members of this environmental group. As she begins to infiltrate this French group, she questions her past assignments as a spy (including charges of entrapping people) so that the narrator unconsciously seeks to find her true self in this new assignment. She sees Bruno's emails as a way to understand the life she has chosen.

Kushner writes beautifully, and the novel works on a sentence-by-sentence level. Kushner builds the tension for how this new assignment will end. However, the book ultimately disappointed me. I wanted to like "Creation Lake," but I felt that the philosophical elements of the novel did not always mesh with the spy/ecoterroism angle. Kushner moves from the new assignment to the narrator's past to Bruno's philosophy. We hear from Bruno a lot, and it becomes oppressive after a certain point. I wanted to learn more about Sadie and less about Bruno's thoughts on every possible subject. We learn more about Bruno than the narrator, and I wish it had been the reverse.

Rachel Cusk is one the most brilliant writers. I loved all of her previous works- they are individual, inventive, inspiring and beautifully written. While there's lots to admire in Creation Lake, I felt the plot and characters struggled under the load of research and history. Rather endless descriptions overwhelmed funny and insightful passages.
thank you for the opportunity to read- I learned much but didn't love the experience

Creation Lake is about undercover agent Sadie Smith's efforts to infiltrate a group of radical eco-activists in a remote area of France for her shadowy big business paymasters. As with the infamous "Spy Cops" operation in Britain her job is to entrap and spy on people who put society and the environment above profit.
Billed as a Spy Thriller it's very well-written but short on thrills,that doesn't mean it's bad,it's far from it,but if you're expecting Lisbeth Salander.
A subplot is the musings of commune leader Bruno Lacombe on the Neanderthals ,that form quite a lot of the book, I found more interesting than the main plot.
A very good read but not quite "what it says on the tin" and while I found the parts about the Neanderthals fascinating I'm not sure that everyone expecting a Spy thriller. would share that sentiment.