The Factory

The key setting in Nothing Special is Andy Warhol’s famous studio, the Factory. Mae spends much of the novel working in the studio as a typist, transcribing a series of recordings made by Warhol and his associates. Mae describes the Factory as “a room covered in demented silver paper, tacky and peeking… On the couch, some young people were stretching, yawning as if waking up, although it was the afternoon” (66). Throughout the novel, the Factory acts as a tangible symbol of the relentlessly cool, transgressive, and authentic image that Warhol and his associates attempt to cultivate.

New York

A vast majority of the novel takes place in New York City. Mae grows up in New York; she describes her own “familiarity with the city, how blasé I was to the insanity of it” (110). Shelley, meanwhile, grows up in an unnamed, nondescript town. For her, New York...