Introduction

The Martin Chronicles debuts with Dan Kois (Slate), Jason Zinoman (New York Times), and Parul Sehgal (New Yorker) discussing Martin Amis' first novel, The Rachel Papers, published in 1973 when Amis was just 24 years old. Why is Charles Highway so disgusting? Why isn't Rachel Noyes Jewish? And how does the son of a successful, controversial novelist secure his entrée into the literary world?