This was my first book of 2007 and I absolutely loved it. The ending was a bit of a let-down, but in general I thought Smith did a phenomenal job of juggling different time periods, generations, ages, and ethnicities—not to mention almost too many characters to keep track of! Dealing with the kind of themes she dealt with takes serious skill and her characters were truly three-dimensional. Despite the somewhat disappointing ending, I enjoyed this immensely and will probably read it again someday. Until then, I look forward to reading more of Smith’s writing.

My first book of 2007! It was nearly the final book of 2006, but I didn’t quite get through it in time. :)

Just a quick warning that there are SPOILERS ahead, so if you haven’t read this book and don’t want to know some of the things that happen, you might want to skip this review. :)

I’ve just now had a look at the previous comments others have made, and I’m glad I didn’t read them before now (in other words, until after I’d finished the book). Which is funny, in a way, because I agree COMPLETELY! I felt exactly the same way about the ending, and it’s gratifying to discover that I’m not the only one who felt that way. However, I’m afraid that if I’d read those comments beforehand, I might not have enjoyed this book as much as I did, and I did enjoy it. It was a very interesting read, and I’d hate to have missed out on that just because the ending is anti-climactic, to say the least.

I really enjoyed her prose. It was interesting, and fresh, but not too heavy on slang. I thought her style fit very well with the subject matter – a blending (or clash, in many cases) of cultures. I loved the way she wove each individual thread into the book, and even how she brought them all together again at the end. It just would have been nice if she’d then done something a bit more spectacular with all her previous good work. (I’m put in mind of Stephen King, and not in a good way). I will admit, though, that I was glad she didn’t do some of the things I was afraid she would do (namely, killing characters that I would have been sad to see die).

I especially loved Irie, and found her speech on the bus to be marvelous (and relevant). I’d guessed Archie’s secret (I’m fairly certain we’re supposed to have guessed), but I was surprised (and pleasantly so) when the focus of this secret turned up when he did. There were some other lines that really struck me – one in particular about how we always believe ourselves to be worth loving, and the comment that perhaps this isn’t really a reasonable thing. That perhaps people who don’t return our love aren’t “damaged” as we like to believe they are. An interesting thought. There were many others in this book, too. (Although most of them have been lost from my memory, since it took me several weeks to read this book, what with the intervention of the holidays). I found it relevant and thought-provoking. One of my favorite things is that I managed to be annoyed (even disgusted) with the behavior of most (all?) of the characters at one point or another, and yet, I still managed to like them, in spite of their bad behavior.

On the whole, a meaty, well-written book. I will read others by this author. Hopefully she’ll have learned her lesson, and her new works actually have a proper denouement. 8/10

It’d be so easy to call this a bloody good book, but I’m going to step back and save it for The Bloody Good Book that Zadie Smith is going to write some day. This is incredibly promising writing, but not there yet. I read it very soon after it came out, and though have been disappointed by the later two, she is a writer I’m going to keep a look out for.

i was so outraged at the ending immediately after reading this, i made a hasty proclamation, and said this was not worth consuming. on foresight, i realize i really enjoyed this book, which made the shoddy ending all the harder to bear. now i see it was simply the mistake of a new writer who herself sees the great flaw she made.

i would reccommend reading it with a warning. and i believe Zadie’s next book will be absolutely brilliant.

i totally loved this book, until the last five pages. i’ve never read a book that fell so flat on it’s face at the end. boo!

Andrew was reading White Teeth on the bus today and it reminded me I want to read it. I am going to read the one with the light lavender cover (and will check it out from the sf public library for which I have a card!)

(completed March 23, 2005)

As I’ve said before, I really enjoy books that are in depth character studies, and this one deifnitely fits that category. It’s very predicatable, but only because the lives of these people are so generically dysfunctional. Glad I read it.

It’s supposed to make you laugh…

Although so far the story doesn’t interest me much, I love Zadie Smith’s fresh, interesting writing.

I’m giving up! I got to about page 200 but I just don’t care what happens to these people.

I think I enjoyed this book a bit more on the second read. I appreciated Smith’s humour and her skill with words a lot more as well.