An Englishman, Archie Jones, and a Bengali Muslim named Samad Iqbal, who first met after World War II in Turkey, encounter each other again 30 years later in the ...
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An Englishman, Archie Jones, and a Bengali Muslim named Samad Iqbal, who first met after World War II in Turkey, encounter each other again 30 years later in the North-West London neighborhood where they live with their families. The daughter of Archie and his Jamaican wife falls in love with Samad's radical fundamentalist son. Archie's sister-in-law is a fervent Jehovah's witness. Samad is plagued by guilt over his affair with his children's schoolteacher. And a nearby Jewish family tries to interfere in their lives. In a stew of often competing multicultural elements, Archie, Samad, and their families struggle to find their identities amid the complexities of the 1970s. Zadie Smith calls her acclaimed novel "a utopian view" of race relations: "It's what it might be and what it should be and maybe what it will be." A New York Times "Editors' Choice" for one of the best books of 2000. Nominated in 2001 for a National Book Critics Circle Award.
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Description: Very good. Book has appearance of light use with no easily noticeable wear. Millions of satisfied customers and climbing. Thriftbooks is the name you can trust, guaranteed. Spend Less. Read More.
Description: Good. 2000, Hardcover. Used-Good Hall Street Books Proudly ships all books from Brooklyn, NY. All orders are processed and shipped within 24 hours M-F. 100% Money-Back Guarantee and No-Worry return policy.
Description: Good. Shows some signs of wear, and may have some markings on the inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy!
Description: Very Good. Great condition for a used book! Minimal wear. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy!
Description: Acceptable. Former Library book. Shows definite wear, and perhaps considerable marking on inside. Shipped to over one million happy customers. Your purchase benefits world literacy!
Description: Very good in very good dust jacket. Cover slightly dingy, some shelf wear, pages clear and unmarked. Sewn binding. Cloth over boards. With dust jacket. 464 p. Audience: General/trade.
Description: Fair in Fair jacket. This copy has sustained what looks llike a coffee spill to the top edge which has stiffened the pages, but not affected the text. Two stains to the front dust jacket. Would make a good reading copy.
Description: Acceptable. Ships from the UK. Former Library book. Shows definite wear, and perhaps considerable marking on inside. Your purchase also supports literacy charities.
Description: VG- in VG- jacket. Shelf wear to tips, corners and edges of book; jacket is edge worn, wrinkled, soiled, creased. Author's highly praised first book. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. Hard Cover.
Description: Very Good- in very good- jacket. Shelf wear to tips, corners and edges of book; jacket is edge worn, wrinkled, soiled, creased. Author's highly praised first book. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. Hard Cover.
Description: Fine in Fine dust jacket. Hardcover. Random House, 2000. 1st Edition/2nd Printing. Fine Book in Fine Dust Jacket. Price Intact. Overall, a clean and tight copy to add to a collection or read and enjoy. Dust Jacket protected with a new archival cover. Bubble wrapped and shipped promptly in a box.
Description: Near Fine in Very Good jacket. Fiction. 8vo-over 7¾"-9¾" tall. This is the author's first novel. The story of two friends in Northern London, one an Englishman and one a Muslim Bengali immigrant. This book is in near fine condition and appears unread. The dust jacket is in very good condition with a little bit of wear along the edges. The jacket is not price clipped and is in new clear protective covering.
Description: Fine in a near fine dustjacket (price-clipped. ) Hardcover-The author's highly acclaimed first novel, winner of the Whitbread and Guardian prizes. The story of 2 families in London: one headed by Archie, who marries a Jamaican woman, and the other by Archie's best friend, a Muslim Bengali named Samed Iqbal. 448 pp.
Description: Very good in very good dust jacket. Light staining on white dj, spine slightly tilted, pencilled price on ffep, else fine. Sewn binding. Cloth over boards. With dust jacket. 464 p. Audience: General/trade.
"A lot of people seem to start reading this book wanting to like it, but then find they don't. I didn't start off with any intentions but I did like it when I started reading. However as with those people I found I couldn't like it in the end. It starts off being quite a funny description of stereotypical lives of people from different cultures thrown together in London. Then it seems to lose its way in little sub-stories which one assumes are meant to give some kind of depth to the characters but none of the characters are likeable nor do they have any positive attributes. I don't have anything against books without positive characters, but you do end up thinking everyone would have been a lot better off if they had all stayed in their own countries. The author does have some good points about how silly people can be, but increasingly toward the end of the book each chapter seems to end in some incomprehensible rant about who knows what. I'd have given one star more for each 100 pages of nonsense cut out."
"I hated this book, and so did my Writers Reading Fiction classmates and professor. We couldn't even get through the whole thing due to boredom. I hear that many praise Zadie Smith for her first novel, but I am not one of those fans!"
"Since this debut work, Zadie Smith has become a British darling of the literary scene. Frankly, I don't know why. This is a post-war attempt of the intersecting-storylines-concept of "Crash," with the nonsensical scientific jargon of Mystery Science Theater 3000.
Granted, there are two notably funny scenes, where someone dies after slipping on hair rollers at the salon, and banging their head on the shampoo bowl. There's also the humorous Dad of the twins, who protests most everything the boys' school coordinates for secular holidays. He vents his frustrations at trying to maintain a proper Muslim household as his sons wear black armbands to mourn the cancellation of the school's annual Halloween parade--a bizarre tradition to celebrate souless "wood sprites" as the Dad argues--the school officials cancelled the parade to pacify him.
I still don't understand the bizarre FutureMouse project. However, in the book, it has all the media hysteria and hoopla of Armstrong's landing on the moon. Or the birth of Suri Cruise."
"It is an ambitious book spanning generations and a variety of immigrant cultures that populate London. We found the book to be laugh out loud funny at points and thought the writing was very clever. The close friendship of Archie and Samad, which started in World War II, when they were both fighting for the Allies, was heart of the story. Archie was a typical British working class man and Samad was a Muslim Bengali from Pakistan. Archie married a daughter of a Jehovah's Witness from Jamaica and Samad had an arranged marriage. These characters and their children created a canvas for Zadie Smith to paint a very complex but light hearted picture of modern day London. The story brought together groups from Muslim extremists, animal rights activists, and British intellectuals, whom are destined to meet up in the end of the book over their reaction to animal cloning. There are many good insights into how people connect to various causes, however misguided, finding meaning to their lives within those parameters."
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