Vendor
	Fritz Agency Christian Dittus
Original language
English
Categories
Fiction & Related items

ASTRID SEES ALL

Natalie Standiford

New York, 1984: 22-year-old Phoebe Hayes is a young woman in search of her dark side. The recent death of her father has crushed her so thoroughly that her mother tries to keep her home in Baltimore to recover. But Phoebe needs to return to New York to confront Ivan, the older man who wronged her, and to chase the glamorous life she craves. With her best friend, Carmen, she runs away to the East Village, disappearing into an underworld haunted by artists, It Girls, and lost souls trying to party their pain away. Carmen juggles her junkie-poet boyfriend, Doozie, and a sexy painter named Jem, while, as Astrid the Star Girl, Phoebe tells fortunes in a nightclub and plots her revenge on Ivan.

But when the intoxicating brew of sex, drugs, and self-destruction leads Phoebe to betray Carmen, Carmen disappears, and Phoebe's true descent into darkness begins. She has a chance to save herself - and Carmen, if she can find her - but to do it she must face the shadows she's been running from. If she can conquer the gods and monsters of this dangerous underworld, she will emerge to find the true source of her power - but she must survive the passage first.

For readers of Patti Smith and fans of Fleabag, ASTRID SEES ALL is a tale of love, friendship, sex, and grief in New York's last bohemia, the glittering and decadent downtown club scene of the 1980s.

A Sarah Burns book for the Gernert Company.

Available products
Book Published 2021-04-01 by Atria Books

Comments

I loved this dark and smart thriller about the East Village in the 1980's, starring a bright but lost young woman who is determined to chase danger and glamour and madness right up to the edge of reason. With shades of both Gatsby and Warhol, Standiford has created a vivid portrait of a seedy, edgy, artsy, and seething New York City that will never exist again. I flew through these pages. -- Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat Pray Love and City of Girls

The author's glee in evoking the zeitgeist of the 1980s is infectious....Smart details, lively digressions, and spot-on period snapshots. ? Kirkus

Astrid Sees All has the startling vibrancy of a Nan Goldin photograph and the heartbreak and wit of a film by Preston Sturges, which is to say Natalie Standiford's vision is an original one. I loved Astrid so much that I didn't want this funny, sad novel to ever end. Standiford has the storytelling charm! -- Rene Steinke, author of Holy Skirts and Friendswood

Astrid Sees All is an unforgettable story: a Lower East Side night-world full of damaged young dreamers, all kids who want to be stars, but end up just breaking each other's hearts along with their own. Only Natalie Standiford could bring these girls to life with so much tender wit, street-wise compassion, and brilliant soul. She gives this novel the beautifully fragile strut of a Lou Reed guitar ballad. -- Rob Sheffield, author of Love Is a Mix Tape

Standiford captures a beating, smoky world....There is page-turning plot aplenty here, dealing with the pains of grief, addiction, and simply growing up, all made endurable by love and friendship. ? Booklist

Astrid Sees All zooms us back to the 1980s in the most delightful and nostalgic way: New York in all its craziness and magnetism is alive again through the clear-eyed observations and adventures of our witty and generous narrator. -- Martha McPhee, author of An Elegant Woman

A new wave, coming-of-age story, Astrid Sees All is a blast from the past, taking the reader back to the ratty Bohemia of the Lower East Side of the early 80s, complete with squatters, cold-water sublets, white punks on dope in the trashed bathrooms of trendy clubs, and even a cameo by the king of downtown, Lou Reed. Sharp-eyed and light on her feet, Natalie Standiford is the perfect tour guide for one young woman's leap from the ivied halls of college into another, even more unreal world. -- Stewart O'Nan, author of The Speed Queen

Astrid Sees All is so fun to read you might miss the grief that fuels this novel. Phoebe, the book's narrator, moves through the surreal, kaleidoscopic world of 1980's club life as well as the dilapidated and electric East Village. Her struggle for self definition is remarkably honest; Phoebe is a feminist heroine as complicated as she is compelling. -- Darcey Steinke, author of Flash Count Diary and Suicide Blonde