Every line seems to thrill and break in an indifferent social space, and the result is very moving

[A] blade-sharp coming-of-age debut novel . . . [Flattery] captures the absurdity and the pain, the texture of city streets and the squalid luxury, and brings a deadpan wit to the whole sex and drugs and Pop-art scene

A raucously talented young Irish writer … Flattery is witty, propulsive and darkly delightful to read

Sixties New York is vividly conveyed, but the triumph is in the capture of moody, prickly, ambitious Mae through whose eyes everything is seen . . . [A] witty and unique coming-of-age novel

The author of short story collection Show Them A Good Time is one to watch . . . Exploring the rift between their public and private selves, this darkly funny tale draws parallels between 60s New York and today

Flattery has a fine ear for dialogue . . . In fitting her complex, heartfelt, vexing characters into the spaces left where the names of Warhol’s typists should have been, Flattery is finally giving those egos, or a version of them, a chance to tell their own story, in their own words

The assuredness of her writing belies the fact that Nothing Special – a tale of identity and purpose set in Andy Warhol’s infamous Factory – is her inaugural novel . . . [Nothing Special] does an excellent job of evoking 1960s New York, and balances its ideas of voyeurism and longing expertly

This debut novel is that rare thing, an original, off-kilter coming-of-age story, in which life and art collide in unsettling ways

Nothing Special is as stylishly written as its predecessor Show Them a Good Time. Indeed there are shades of Saul Bellow, in her rendering of New York that ‘shrieking cartoon hell’ . . . [Flattery] deserves only praise

Nothing Special confirms Flattery as a bracingly original writer; her observations clear-eyed and cool-headed, never pretentious. Readers may be tempted to underline every other sentence in this striking debut from an exciting new voice’

Flattery demonstrates here how she can shape on a larger scale and be incredibly inventive in the process . . . [Her] willingness to be ugly and merciless on the page is what makes her work so relentlessly engaging

A riveting read about fame, myth-making and finding your own identity

Flattery is a keen observer of relational dynamics in groups of women, and how these connections can both support and strangle. Her characters feel complicated and real

If you’ve ever found yourself obsessing over Edie Sedgwick (her biography by Jean Stein is a must-read) then Nothing Special will be right up your street. Set against 60s New York and Andy Warhol’s Factory, this is a coming-of-age story that conjures up the lure of the era

Nicole Flattery’s treatment of determined, bewildered young women – as they discover the vast distance between how they are perceived and how they feel themselves to be – is brilliantly gloomy, droll and so out-of-body as to be real . . .They try on and take off their survival instincts like costumes, in a painful, beguiling, apt twist on art for art’s sake. The authenticity of Flattery’s work offers its own reassurance that sometimes art is good

There are many things to enjoy in Nicole Flattery’s debut novel … Mae is an engaging protagonist with a wit about her coming-of-age struggles

Nothing Special evokes the same literary lost-girl vibes as recent bestsellers like Emma Cline’s The Guest, but the narrative is wrapped around an intriguing exploration of art, work and fame.

A sharp portrait of New York’s art scene in the sixties and one woman’s place in it. Through inventive prose, Flattery writes into history the under-celebrated voices, and she does it in a masterful way. A superb novel

In enviably elegant prose, she manages to be both arch and deadly serious. Wonderful stuff.

Audacious, original and fully achieved – this is a remarkable novel

One of the most exciting releases of 2023 . . . A dizzying exploration of sex, freedom, art and voyeurism, seen through the coming-of-age of 17-year-old Mae. Deftly woven and captivating, it signals the arrival of a new literary talent

Told with dry wit and sharp observation, Nothing Special speaks in a profound and original way to our age of vacuous consumerism, our empty quests for self-discovery, and our parasitism on celebrity and trend . . . A bold and funny coming-of-age novel about the emptiness of the cult of self, the fetishisation of fame, and the aimless drift of late-stage capitalism

Flattery’s sentences are astonishing. Their wit and ingenuity, the apt oddness of her metaphors, are addictive and relentlessly delightful, and then all of a sudden her language snaps into an exactness of feeling that knocks you sideways. A special, singular, blazingly original and truly achieved first novel

I couldn’t put this razor sharp, darkly funny coming-of-age story down

A wry, witty and wonderful novel from a brilliantly captivating storyteller

I derive so much energy from Nicole Flattery’s writing. Nothing Special casts such a stylish and transportive spell, perhaps it’s better to dust off adjectives like “marvelous” and “fabulous.” I’ll never again ride an escalator without thinking of this book