Great Jones Street (Contemporary American Fiction)

A troubling satire of the romantic myth of stardom and the empty heart of rock and roll, more relevant than ever in our celebrity-obsessed times.

Bucky Wunderlick is a rock and roll star. Dissatisfied with a life that has brought fame and fortune, he suddenly decides he no longer wants to be a commodity. He leaves his band mid-tour and holes up in a dingy, unfurnished apartment in Great Jones Street. Unfortunately, his disappearing act only succeeds in inflaming interest. As faithful fans await messages, Bucky encounters every sort of roiling force he is trying to escape.

DeLillo’s third novel is more than a musical satire: it probes the rights of the individual, foreshadows the struggle of the artist within a capitalist world and delivers a scathing portrait of our culture’s obsession with the lives of the few.

"Brilliant…deeply shocking… Looks at rock music, nihilism, and urban decay." The New York Review of Books

"DeLillo has the force and imagination of Thomas Pynchon or John Barth, with a sense of proportion and style which these would-be giants often lack." The Irish Times