Ayn Rand Explained is an engrossing account of the life, work, and influence of Ayn Rand: her career, from youth in Soviet Russia to Hollywood screenwriter and then to ideological guru; her novels and other fiction writings, including the perennial best-sellers, The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged; her forays into ethics, epistemology, and metaphysics; her influence on-and personal animosity toward-both conservatism and libertarianism. Rand's theory of Objectivism offers a comprehensive package of beliefs encompassing the ethics of rational egoism, rejection of all religion and outright atheism, the arts as expressions of good or bad metaphysical and ethical values, personal freedom from political interference, laissez-faire capitalism, and limited government.