City on Fire: A novel

Written by Garth Risk Hallberg

Narrated by Rebecca Lowman, Tristan Morris, Bronson Pinchot and 3 more

A big-hearted, boundary-vaulting novel that heralds a remarkable new talent: set in 1970s New York, a story outsized in its generosity, warmth, and ambition, its deep feeling for its characters, its exuberant imagination.

The individuals who live within this extraordinary first novel are: Regan and William Hamilton-Sweeney, estranged heirs to one of the city's largest fortunes; Keith and Mercer, the men who, for better or worse, love them; Charlie and Samantha, two suburban teenagers seduced by downtown's punk scene; an obsessive magazine reporter and his idealistic neighbor; and the detective trying to figure out what any of them have to do with a shooting in Central Park. Their entangled relationships open up the loneliest-seeming corners of the crowded city. And when the infamous blackout of July 13, 1977, plunges this world into darkness, each of these lives will be changed forever. A novel about love and betrayal and forgiveness, about art and truth and rock 'n' roll, about how the people closest to us are sometimes the hardest to reach--about what it means to be human.

Read by Rebecca Lowman with Macleod Andrews, Alex McKenna, Paul Michael, Tristan Morris, and Bronson Pinchot.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group
• Release date: Oct 13, 2015
• ISBN: 9781101888780

Reviews for City on Fire

[zurilector · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Very long, very dense, and a bit slow and redundant, although it is very well written and reflects the 1970s very well, when the city of New York was a real dump, as well as the punk movement and underground art. What weighs it down is that the story struggles to progress; there are many flashbacks and interludes that make you lose the thread a bit, and characters that then fade away. The final part of the blackout is quite interesting, but it takes too long to arrive. (Translated from Spanish)

[Lectora empedernida · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

July 3, 10:51 PM, THE BOOKS OF THE LITTLE WOLF (XLII), It's the 1970s, Nixon has already resigned but the racial, economic, and social differences in New York are truly significant. The author, Garth Risk, focuses the plot on a diverse range of characters, with storylines that could not be more twisted, bordering on conspiracy. We will meet William and Mercer, the former white and incredibly rich, the latter black and a high school teacher at an all-girls school without economic problems. William detests his billionaire family so much that he disappears for a dozen years, Mercer is his partner, but he wishes to be rich and live as William scorns. Another couple, Charlie and Samantha, live in the New York suburbs, adore the radical side of life and Lower Manhattan, while the music of a young Patti Smith echoes through the streets. All of them will converge in late 1977, when the great New York blackout occurred, which did indeed happen, lasting two days due to overheating. 48 hours during which assaults, outrages, and widespread chaos invaded the "city that never sleeps".....but if it goes dark, if care is not taken. Chases, assassination attempts, family reckonings, the search for truth and redemption, will be read in this immense book, rightly called "city on fire." The only criticism I have is the excessive use of interludes, causing an unnecessary length in the novel. They are superfluous and.... there are quite a few. Although it is very descriptive and well-structured, I give it three ??? literary feathers, for the reasons previously mentioned. A book that has been translated into seventeen languages, and our own would be no less, leaving my analysis here, in my little WhatsApp group that gives this section its name and on ALIBRATE. Signed: The Lonely Little Wolf. (Translated from Spanish)

[soraxtm-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

-thus ends ends the longest police procedural ever
-The real evil person was a punk rocker anarchist
-the hero was a cop who was just about to retire, whose wife about to leave him because of the case.
-You can guess what happened to him.
-way to go Hallberg

[daniel5estes · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The language is thick and luxurious, and you easily find yourself fully present with the characters. I've never lived in Manhattan, nor in any big city for that matter, but while immersed in City on Fire I felt like a native New Yorker. The author, Garth Risk Hallberg, has a knack for capturing the narrative moments like you're a little bit in the character's heads, seeing the world from their POV, and a little bit taking in the micro settings of 1970's NYC. That's quite the accomplishment given this is the author's debut novel.

[reader1009-863136 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

fiction--1970s NY/Long Island; interconnected personal dramas. I got to page 327 and would have gladly finished it (eventually) if I didn't have other more interesting things to read, and if there weren't a whole long line of folks waiting to read this library copy when I return it. I didn't mind the writing, but the character development got pretty boring a lot of the time (ok, a lot of their narrative voices sound very similar and much of their stories is pretty mundane and dawdly)--by the time one gets that far into the book, one should be fairly engrossed and eagerly turning pages, rather than waiting impatiently for the plot to move (rather than slowly circling the drain like so much extraneous detritus). I was actually itching to get back to the nonfiction book that I am also reading, so I could feel like I'd actually accomplished/learned something.
So, kind of disappointing, but might still be worth some of the praise and attention this book has been getting, if one has patience to digest in small bites rather than trying to finish in a weekend.

[asxz-2 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Hugely ambitious, huge book. It may even be too much book. If he'd cut it by a third he might have found a wider audience. Still, at its best, it feels like a Bonfire of the Vanities for the Twenty Teens from the Nineteen Seventies. Outmoded even before it was published, sprawling and unfocused, this is a work that will be less read than it deserves but relished by most that bother.

[jonfaith · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

When you were young, you had the resources to rebuild after each crater fate blasted in your life. Beyond a certain age, though, you could only wall off the damage and leave it there.


A conceptual art project is described in the final pages of the novel depicting an inscription which requires ten days to complete followed by ten days of effacement. I felt something akin in this climb, this particular reading. Much of what needed to be said was accomplished in the novel's first half. The plateau before the descent didn't yield much satisfaction, nor a fog of uncertainty. It was lukewarm,. Music from another room. I was left, pondering. reflecting on the joy of listening to the Red Garland Trio while carving a watermelon--for other people. I don't care for melon.

This is a busy novel, though, frankly-- it lacks in ideas. It isn't heady. An ensemble of characters delineate NYC in that fecund period of 1976-77. The echoes of the pyrotechnics of the Bicentennial find physical manifestation in the arrival of AIDS. Punks chords of dissent turn blight into renewal. Everyone will be rich, except for the poor.
Fuck the poor.
Charles Bronson.
Bernie Goetz.
Do the Right Thing.

As noted this is more Balzac than even a Franzen. At the core is a crime, much like Bleak House and the clues to such are disparate. Many of them are revealed in the "found" text but City on Fire (a line in punk song) lacks the ominous detachment which make a W.G. Sebald or a Teju Cole so unsettling. I wish I could praise this, call it a punk Naked Singularity---but that comparison is ludicrous. This is a fat novel for the vicarious. It is timid fare. A reference to Marcuse doesn't leave the novel steeped in the Frankfurt School. City on Fire does however make one want to listen to Patti Smith--I do thank the author for that.

[wellreadcatlady · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Whew! What a long book. City on Fire involves a lot of characters in the mid 70s in New York and how their lives intertwine around a young woman's shooting on New Years before and after. I give it 3.5 stars, I liked a lot about this book, the plot is detailed and interesting, but it can be slow moving at times. The writing is well done but way too descriptive, everything gets a metaphor or a simile, it was exhausting. The character's are the best part of the book, they are well developed and complex. I enjoyed the book, but definitely could of been improved.

[rdra1962 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Well, I finished all 900 pages. I wanted to really like it, but I didn't, for all the reasons Donna, Andrew and Max have listed in their reviews at the top of this page. There is no point rewriting what they have so eloquently written!
So much potential - so in dire need of major editing!

[nikkinmichaels · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I appreciate the effort this no doubt took, but I have trouble understanding why something like this needed to be 911 pages. A bit self-indulgent and pretentiously grandiose for my taste.

[wmnch2fam · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A massive, near stream-of-consciousness, tome twisting the story of a number of characters through the mid 1970s culminating in events on the night of the 1977 blackout.

[kerns222 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A dozen characters. Back stories, side stories, up stories, down stories. You know more about them than you do yourself after the 900 plus pages. Balanced characters: rich poor. north south. white black. gay straight. workingclass artiste. punk plunked.
New York stories from the punk, anti-disco, lights out days.
And two truly evil characters: minimal backstory for them, slimy, sneaky, killerish, ratty. Without much to motivate besides greed, desire for power, and sliminess. But those motivate even presidential candidates.
If you have a week and want a time travel book, read it.

[gmmartz · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is an incredible novel, over 900 pages in length, about the events surrounding the murder of a young woman in New York City in the punk-rock 70s. That’s the main plot, yet there are many, many branches to that tree. I’ve truthfully never read anything like it.

City on Fire is chock full of drug use, drinking, sex (gay and straight), rich folk, arsonists, cops, punks, anarchists, a ‘Demon Brother’ and a plethora of other folk. Virtually every character is developed through flashbacks, flash forwards, and other techniques. The action that forms the basis for the main plot takes place early in the book, and the remainder of the book is a joy ride through the NYC that most people with any sense were avoiding back in those days. But there’s so much more.

This is a novel that demands you follow it closely. Multiple generations of a powerful family are a major part of the story, with numerous other characters woven in. The action is non-linear, with time periods bouncing back and forth and forward and backward as different characters are introduced. By the end of the book, when the perpetrator is finally identified, you feel you know every character very well. I’m not saying they’re good people to know- in fact, there are few sympathetic characters in the entire 900 pages of the book.

The writing in City on Fire is just spectacular. I only have a few issues with it: the gratuitous use of obscure words, the over-use of similes, and the inclusion of nearly every generalization about NYC somewhere in the book. In the grand scope of things, 920 pages of excellent prose more than balances out these minor points.

If you enjoy great writing, have a tolerance for descriptions of the NYC of the rough era of the 70s (and all that entails), and you can hang in there for a long book that requires your attention, you’ll be rewarded with an unbelievable ride. I really wonder what Garth Risk Hallberg will do for an encore.

[scullybert · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Not worth the effort

[msf59 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

New York City: Summer of 1977. It was a season of sweltering temps, blackouts and a killer named Son of Sam.
The city was a powder-keg. It is also the backdrop to this massive novel, which is centered around the shooting of a young girl in Central Park and a wealthy family named, Hamilton-Sweeney. There are a multitude of characters. Shifting narratives and twisty, time-lines.
This was one of the most buzzed about books, last year, and the publisher paid an ungodly advance. 2 million? Obviously they pushed it like crazy. Honestly, I don't get it. I was very impressed by the author's ambition and scope and the writing was pretty solid but the story never really took off for me and that's too bad, considering, that at 900 pages, it was a major commitment.

[citizenjoyce · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

You know how sometimes when you're reading a book you just want it to go on and on because you don't want to leave the characters? This is the opposite of that. The writer was so enamoured with his characters, plot and setting that he couldn't make himself stop. An editor was drastically needed.

[susan.macura · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This debut novel is exactly what the hype was all about and more. Set in New York City in 1976 through the Blackout on July 13, 1977, this book examines the lives of a number of characters who through fate, become entwined. There is Regan and Keith, she an heir to a famous wealthy family in the city, who experience martial troubles when Keith strays. There is William, Regan’s estranged gay brother, who set off on his own to find fulfillment as an artist, drug addict, musician and lover of Mercer, who brings his own baggage to this relationship. It is members of William’s band that form a group bent on taking down the city. The group draws groupies Charlie and Samantha who play their own roles in the crisis that forms over the city on the eve of the blackout. Then you add in a reporter, art assistant, detective and fireworks specialist dad of Samantha to help tie all of the ends in place. It has it all – family dynamics, love, friendship, political power trips and business espionage as well as great character development. It is a compelling tale that is beautifully written, making it truly one of the books to read this year.

[annbury_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Pretty good, if long novel. Who knows why all the hoopla about this book, which is an ordinary book with a lot of detail about NYC in the 70s when the punk movement was just starting. I lived in the City during that time, having been born here, and the writing rings true. It kept me going for page after page although I skipped most of the crap in between.

[tbergen-1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

The length of this book is it's only saving grace: it allows character development, and the character's are the only element of this book that are engaging enough to support the read. The characters never really get fully fleshed out but following their thoughts and stories is rewarding. The plot is meaningless, convoluted, and does not appear related to the time period the author has chosen to attempt to illuminate. It's a nice try, but only borderline worth the read.

[librarylord99 · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

Ugh. A self masturbatory door stop. I got about 300 pages in, and after reading about the stereotypical Pulaski the crippled cop, I just started laughing.

Garth would not know a tough city if it slapped him in his face. Maybe step across the river and hang out in Booker's Jersey for awhile.

Party on Garth with your two million bucks.

Also does anyone actually edit anymore? Anyone?

[melissarochelle_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Read from August 28 to November 30, 2015

Nope. Everyone exclaiming how wonderful this novel is -- LIES. They're doing it because they're just impressed with themselves for finishing it. What you'll read below will most likely contain SPOILERS. Keep reading at your own risk (or just read this instead of reading the book).

I started this book at the END OF AUGUST. I read roughly six chapters and then sat it aside to read a bunch of other books. I picked it back up because those first few chapters did pique my interest. By the time I was halfway through it was too late to just abandon it and I wanted to know WHO SHOT SAM.

Who shot Samantha is the mystery that moved this book forward for me (someone dared to call this book thrilling -- LIES).

The way the story unfolds is more than a bit annoying. Once Sam is shot we move back in time to BEFORE and then we end up back in "the present" to Sam in the hospital. Then we GO BACK again and make our way back to "the present". THEN IT GOES BACK AGAIN.

There's one part where one of the main characters (Mercer) travels to his childhood home and hides his brother's gun. This entire chapter WAS POINTLESS.

By the time I made my way to the THE BLACKOUT (oohhh, it's dark!), I was DONE. It went on FOR.EV.VER. But at least I finally found out who shot Samantha -- Surprise! Surprise! It was her weird punk "friend" Sewer Girl with assists from the other S.G. and D.T.

And even through ALL OF THAT. I still don't know how in the world the Demon Brother managed to hook up with Nicky Chaos. Or why Mercer is now in Europe. Or how Will and Cate finally ended up back at their mom's apartment.

To sum up -- this is an overwritten novel that I would not recommend. The interludes were the best part of the 900+ pages. There were a few chapters that I found myself enjoying, but more often than not I found myself confused. Two stars (the interludes bumped it up from one star).

Reading Progress
08/28 currently-reading
08/28 3.0% "I've read two chapters so far and I feel like I need 1. A dictionary nearby 2. A list of characters 3. Someone to hold it for me & 4. An editor. But the ridiculous part: I want to keep reading."
10/25 13.0% "Anyone out there ever used "pusillanimous" in a sentence?"
11/10 22.0% "I'd like to know how many people have finished this book since its publication. I can never find a good time to read it because it's so stinkin' heavy or I'm too tired to to read it (takes a lot of brain power and the occasional research break to look up words no one actually uses in conversation)."
11/12 31.0% "Oooh! Now the cover art makes sense...but why'd the chapter have to end like that?! What happened?!"
11/12 35.0% "Am I supposed to understand what Nicky Chaos just said to Charlie?"
11/13 36.0% "If I start skipping the Charlie chapters, will I really be missing anything?"
11/20 44.0% "Raise your hand if you know what ratiocination, phalanstery, and/or suppurate means."
11/20 45.0% "So maybe it isn't the Charlie chapters that I want to skip, but ANY chapter with Nicky Chaos."
11/21 49.0% "Some chapters, I'm convinced it's worth finishing. Other chapters, I wonder why I've read this far. Not all of these characters are necessary and some of these chapters don't even make sense. I understand now why there's a "mystery" label on the spine because I do have many questions." 1 comment
11/22 55.0% "We're going BACK to 1959?! Oh.em.gee. I'm over halfway through...no quitting now."
11/22 55.0% "Also...it's difficult to keep up with "when" I am in the story between all of the perspectives. I remember way back in the first few chapters questioning if it was on New Year's Eve or before New Year's Eve. It seemed to go back and forth depending on which character we were with."
11/23 60.0% "So this might be spoiler-ish, but I find this interesting (for lack of a better word). Out of the many characters in this novel, 3 with major parts are women. So far 2 of them are victims -- one is shot in a park and the other raped at her father's engagement party. The men it's drugs, writing struggles, wrong place/wrong time, being an adopted red-headed teenager. Maybe I'm belittling the male problems?"
11/24 69.0% "Did the author forget about Mercer through that entire last section? Was any of that really necessary? I think not. The things that did come up as "a-ha moments" could have easily been snuck in elsewhere. And then the Will L part...it's a little late in the book to make me ask more questions. I want answers now."
11/29 95.0% "I feel like the pages are multiplying. This last bit is going on FOREVER." 1 comment
11/29 100.0% "I preferred the interludes over any other sections. They weren't nearly as overwritten as the rest of this novel."
11/30 finished

[voracious_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

How to describe this very, very long book about New York City in the 1970's? This is a complicated story involving numerous characters, all of whom interact at various points. Each chapter takes the perspective of a different character, including two suburban teenagers involved in the underground punk scene, a few anarchist "revolutionaries" who engage in firesetting around NYC, an artist/junkie son of a very high society family and his African-American lover, the artist's sister and her ex-husband, a Vietnamese art curator, a journalist, and a retiring cop. When one of the aforementioned characters is shot in a park outside a high society ball on New Year's Eve, it is unclear who is responsible. As the story unravels, each of the characters' life experiences and perspectives are considered, although until the very end, it is nearly impossible to figure out who was responsible for the shooting.

This is a very rich, well described novel of a cultural time-period and specific place in our near past. Although it was somewhat slow moving, I enjoyed the character development and the sensory experience of being in NYC during the early punk scene. However, I also spent almost an entire month reading this 940-page tome. I got through it, but I think I would have enjoyed it more if it was about half the length. Was it up to the hype? Possibly. If nothing else, than for the amazing amount of effort it took to create a story of such depth and magnitude. Give it a shot if you have nothing to do for the next few weeks!

[antrat1965 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

At first, I thought this was going to be a great book. And it may have been if an editor chopped about 300 pages.
I love long books. That was one of the things that drew me to this one. But the last part of this novel just dragged on interminably.
A good story that was lost in the midst of pretentious, self reflecting muck. I at one point wanted to rip the pages out myself!
There are much better books out there as long or longer. I would advise staying away from this over-hyped monstrosity.

[hccpsk · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I need to say that I did not finish this book, but I feel my time into it warrants a rating. It is not often that you can be 400+ pages into a book and realize that A) You are only halfway through and B) You do not care what happens because C) Nothing has happened yet. There is nothing wrong with this book, but if a book is going to be this long it really needs to be worth it (i.e. A Little Life, The Goldfinch) and for me this was not.

[lisapeet · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

FINALLY finished, and I just didn't love it. There were parts I liked a lot and parts I liked a bit and parts that I thought were really overwritten and/or overwrought, but that's the thing—too many parts, not enough whole. And at 900 pages, that gets frustrating. I liked his use of language for the most part—I think it could have been pared down a lot, no matter how brilliant his power of association might be, and it often was—and the plot is interesting, and the characters are good, though the voices blurred together a bit. I think this would have been an excellent 300- or 400-page book. But the good folks at Knopf obviously had something else in mind—if the idea of editing is to kill your darlings, Hallberg is a Buddhist of the highest order—he's stepping around the proverbial ants on the sidewalk, he loves them so.Still, I was taken enough with it to finish, and I'm glad I did. But ultimately it left me feeling kind of hmm, lukewarm.

Not going to use the "a" word (cf every single mainstream review).