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As many other reviewers have commented, I wanted to like this book more than I did. It approached greatness in many ways---the clever and often hilarious dialogue, the quirky characters, the creative family histories, the rich and convincing place descriptions, and so on. Despite the strengths of ea Leggi tutto

White Teeth is an expansive, detailed, and beautifully written attempt to encapsulate the social chaos that blossoms at the bridging of generational, national and sexual mindsets. It reminds me very much of the freeflowing histories written by Marquez and Allende, as well as Salman Rushdie's strange Leggi tutto

One star? Of course this is not a one-star wretched ignominous failure, this is a mighty Dickensian epic about modern Britain. But not for me. It's a question of tone. I have now tried to read this one twice and each time I find I'm groaning quietly and grinding my teeth. Zadie Smith's omniscient na Leggi tutto

i am so sorry to say this...but this was borderline unreadable for me. the description of this book — a family saga told with humor and a wry sociopolitical eye, with the intent of capturing what it was to be a person during a certain era — got me. but this wasn't funny, to me, or clever; it was self Leggi tutto

Un formidabile romanzo d’esordio che descrive la società multiculturale contemporanea con quello che James Wood ha chiamato “realismo isterico”: la prosa caleidoscopica, esagerata ed esilarante si contrappone all’estrema minuzia e alla concretezza con cui si espongono i fatti storici, i nomi dei qua Leggi tutto

This book started bad for me and just got worse. I found the characters to be boring and two-dimensional. Actually, even worse, the author tried to build up the characters in most cases (though doing a poor job, I'd say), but then later reduced their roles to caricatures. So even those I was incline Leggi tutto