I thought of the girl in the photo in Ronnie's studio, the one on layaway. She was probably waiting for him this very moment, somewhere downtown. Checking the clock, applying lipstick, concentrating herself into an arrow pointed at Ronnie. Doing the various things women did when they had to wait for something they wanted.

— Rachel Kushner

I usually get up between 7 A.M. and 8 A.M., have coffee, and go right to work. It's really important not to get sidetracked in the morning, so I'm still in that dreamy state for my writing.

— Rachel Kushner

I was doing that thing the infatuated do, stitching destiny onto the person we want stitched to us.

— Rachel Kushner

Most go to prison not on account of their irreducible uniqueness as people but because they are part of a marginalized sector of the population who never had a chance, who were slated for it early on.

— Rachel Kushner

My dad had a Vincent Black Shadow, which was a quite particular thing: it was the fastest cycle of its era... It sparked a world for me; when I was old enough, I got a motorcycle.

— Rachel Kushner

There's an innocent displacement, a dreaming, and idols are perfect for a little girl's dreaming. They aren't real. They aren't the gas station attendant trying to lure you into the back of the service station, a paperboy trying to lure you into a tool shed, a friend's father trying to lure you into his car. Furthermore, they don't lure. Furthermore, they beckon, but like desert mirages.

— Rachel Kushner

The Seventies seemed like this really open time. There were a lot of strong women characters deciding what kind of artists they wanted to be.

— Rachel Kushner

These women were taking over these former manufacturing warehouses in Soho and figuring out a way to be fashionable and viable without money. It's hard to imagine a life like that in Manhattan now - there's something romantic about it.

— Rachel Kushner

Tone is somewhat totalizing in that, once I locate it, it tells me what kind of syntax to use, what word choices to make, how much white space to leave on the page, what sentence length, what the rhythmic patterning will be. If I can't find the tone, I sometimes try narrating through the point of view of someone else.

— Rachel Kushner

What happens slowly carries in each part the possibility of returning to what came before. In an accident everything is simultaneous, sudden, irreversible. It means this: no going back.

— Rachel Kushner