To Smithereens

I had never heard of Rosalyn Drexler before I opened this novel, published in 1972 and reissued this year as the first book from the cool new imprint Hagfish, but she seems like a heck of a woman. Mostly a painter who made her own way through the fist-fighters of Abstract Expressionism and Pop Art (the cover painting to the left is hers), she also has written plays and a dozen or so books in her 98 years (including the novelization of Rocky!), and, like her character Rosa Rubinsky, was for a time a pro wrestler on the sleazy, pre-TV circuit. Writing may have been second to painting for her, but whoa, she can write: To Smithereens is a raunchy, ratty tale that reads a little like The Queen's Gambit seen through the eyes of R. Crumb, and then seen again through the eyes of a savvy, seen-it-all feminist. It's satirical but surprisingly humane toward even its creepiest characters, and best of all, Drexler has a deliciously spot-on ear for the way people talk and think. I loved it.