Editorial Content for All-Night Pharmacy
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Reviewer (text)
Every year, there are a handful of books I read that I have heard about long before their publication date. It’s not because the publishers have a huge marketing budget; it’s because all the cool people on Twitter and Instagram are talking about them (without needing to be paid to do so).
This year, Ruth Madievsky’s debut novel, ALL-NIGHT PHARMACY, was one of those books that had been buzzed about for months, so I was eager to finally get my hands on a copy. When I cracked it open, I found it difficult to put down, and I was thinking about it even when I wasn’t reading it. Maybe my appreciation for the novel doesn’t exactly make me one of the cool people, but I do see what they’re raving about.
"This is a wild, unconventional character study, but it’s also a powerful exploration of what it means to live in relationship to others --- as a sister, a lover or a sympathetic stranger."
When we meet Madievsky’s unnamed narrator, she has just graduated from high school. The narrator’s older sister, Debbie --- who has been more or less estranged from the family since her parents found out she was working as a stripper --- takes her younger sister out for a night on the town. She introduces her to a world where few things are as they seem, an effect that is heightened when they take a handful of unidentified pills.
Over the subsequent months, the sisters grow closer, even as the narrator’s academic ambitions dissolve in a thickening haze of addiction. At first, everything is giddy and fun --- until suddenly it isn’t. Debbie disappears, leaving the protagonist adrift, unsure if this time with Debbie was the best or worst thing that ever happened to her.
The narrator gets a job as a receptionist in a hospital emergency room, largely to maintain easy access to narcotics. She becomes drawn into other people’s dramas and grows especially fascinated by one young woman, Sasha, who purports to be psychic and claims she’s the narrator’s “amulet”: “You’ve walked off a map the universe intends to keep you on,” she says. “I’m going to help you find your way back.”
What follows is a long road to recovery that leads through a recapitulation of childhood sexual trauma, a reckoning of sorts with Sasha and the narrator’s shared origins in the former Soviet Union (including a trip to Moldova), and, finally, a clear-eyed investigation into what happened to Debbie.
It’s probably safe to say that you’ve never read a novel quite like ALL-NIGHT PHARMACY. It swirls through scenes of drug-fueled ecstasy and despair, sex (both blissful and just plain bad), and moments of empathy and grace. Perhaps because Madievsky is a poet, the prose is so full of electricity that it sometimes seems to spark, with sentences begging to be read aloud. This is a wild, unconventional character study, but it’s also a powerful exploration of what it means to live in relationship to others --- as a sister, a lover or a sympathetic stranger.
Teaser
On the night of her high school graduation, a young woman follows her older sister, Debbie, to a bar. After the two share a bag of unidentified pills, the evening turns into a haze of sensual and risky interactions. Our unnamed narrator has always been under Debbie’s spell. Despite her own hesitations, she has always said yes to nights like these. That is, until Debbie disappears. Falling deeper into the life she cultivated with her sister, our narrator gets a job as an emergency room secretary where she steals pills to sell on the side. Cue Sasha, a Jewish refugee from the former Soviet Union who claims to be a psychic tasked with acting as the narrator’s spiritual guide. The nature of this relationship evolves and blurs, a kaleidoscope of friendship, sex, mysticism and ambiguous power dynamics.
Promo
On the night of her high school graduation, a young woman follows her older sister, Debbie, to a bar. After the two share a bag of unidentified pills, the evening turns into a haze of sensual and risky interactions. Our unnamed narrator has always been under Debbie’s spell. Despite her own hesitations, she has always said yes to nights like these. That is, until Debbie disappears. Falling deeper into the life she cultivated with her sister, our narrator gets a job as an emergency room secretary where she steals pills to sell on the side. Cue Sasha, a Jewish refugee from the former Soviet Union who claims to be a psychic tasked with acting as the narrator’s spiritual guide. The nature of this relationship evolves and blurs, a kaleidoscope of friendship, sex, mysticism and ambiguous power dynamics.
About the Book
Rachel Kushner meets David Lynch in this fever dream of an LA novel about a young woman who commits a drunken act of violence just before her sister vanishes without a trace.
On the night of her high school graduation, a young woman follows her older sister, Debbie, to Salvation, a Los Angeles bar patronized by energy healers, aspiring actors and all-around misfits. After the two share a bag of unidentified pills, the evening turns into a haze of sensual and risky interactions --- nothing unusual for two sisters bound in an incredibly toxic relationship. Our unnamed narrator has always been under the spell of the alluring and rebellious Debbie. Despite her own hesitations, she has always said yes to nights like these. That is, until Debbie disappears.
Falling deeper into the life she cultivated with her sister, our narrator gets a job as an emergency room secretary where she steals pills to sell on the side. Cue Sasha, a Jewish refugee from the former Soviet Union who arrives at the hospital claiming to be a psychic tasked with acting as the narrator’s spiritual guide. The nature of this relationship evolves and blurs, a kaleidoscope of friendship, sex, mysticism and ambiguous power dynamics.
With prose pulsing like a neon sign, Ruth Madievsky’s ALL-NIGHT PHARMACY is an intoxicating portrait of a young woman consumed with unease over how a person should be. As she attempts sobriety and sexual embodiment, she must decide whether to search for her estranged sister, or allow her to remain a relic of the past.
