ShelfLook
Tools About
Cover of City of Night

How long does it take to read City of Night?

John Rechy

City of Night by John Rechy takes about 6 hours 58 minutes to read at 250 words a minute.

About 6 hours 58 minutes

A weekend read

First published 1963. 380 pages, about 104,500 words.

14 days at 30 minutes a day

Estimate based on 275 words per page.

At other speeds

Slow, 150 words a minute 11 hours 37 minutes
Average, 250 words a minute 6 hours 58 minutes
Fast, 400 words a minute 4 hours 21 minutes

The page count is the median across 32 editions, so your copy may differ. How we calculate.

About the book

When John Rechy's explosive first novel appeared in 1963, it marked a radical departure in fiction, and gave voice to a subculture that had never before been revealed with such acuity. It earned comparisons to Genet and Kerouac, even as Rechy was personally attacked by scandalized reviewers. Nevertheless, the book became an international bestseller, and fifty years later, it has become a classic. Bold and inventive in style, Rechy is unflinching in his portrayal of one hustling "youngman" and his search for self-knowledge within the neon-lit world of hustlers, drag queens, and the denizens of their world, as he moves from El Paso to Times Square, from Pershing Square to the French Quarter. Now including never-seen original marked galley pages and an interview with the author, Rechy's portrait of the edges of America has lost none of its power to move and exhilarate.

Subjects: City and town life, Fiction, Gay men, Male prostitutes, Male prostitution, Fiction, urban

More by John Rechy

Books like this

Popular books of similar length