Somehow I've found myself owning two copies of this book. Whilst one languishes on Mt To-Be-Read, this one is available to share with the world!

From Publishers Weekly...
'Smith's eagerly awaited second novel begins with a bang, but rapidly loses momentum, slipping from tragicomedy to rather overdetermined farce. The introductory set piece is panoramically sock-o in the best Martin Amis tradition, taking us from Doctor Li-Jin Tandem's outing with his son's friends to see a wrestling match in Albert Hall to his sudden death from a massive stroke. Fifteen years to the week later, Li-Jin's son, Alex, is being pressed by his friends, Adams Jacobs and Joseph Klein, to say Kaddish for his dad. Alex is an autograph trader and obsessive egotist. Over the course of the week, he wrecks his car on an acid trip, goes to New York in quest of the legendary retired actress Kitty Alexander, frees her from her mad manager (who promptly announces her death to the papers, thus inflating the value of her signature) and gets his girlfriend Esther, Adam's sister, angry enough that she suspends their relationship. Smith paints portraits of a very multiculti Judaism: Adam, for instance, is a black Jew, while Alex is a disbelieving Chinese one. Adam's kabbalistic interests are supposed to operate in Smith's text the way Homer's poem operated in Ulysses, giving it a mythic dimension, but the big theme of Jewishness feels tacked on, like a marquee advertising a former attraction. Smith's pen portraits of the shabby, yobbish autograph trading circle are intermittently funny, but her prose is so busy being clever that the laughter never builds. This is disappointing but, even with its faults, the novel points to a literary talent of a high order.'

RELEASE NOTES:

Releasing at meetup - if not taken, then this one will be at the OBCZ at Kaleidoscope!

Thanks lmn60 for bringing this to meet-up brunch. I haven't got around to reading any Zadie Smith. Now's my chance to see if I like her.

Onto TBR!

Well, I've started this book a couple of times and then laid it aside and moved onto other books so I will now take the hint. I just don't think this book is for me. Not sure why, what I read was well written. sometimes its just not what I need to read so I'm taking this to brunch meet-up. Someone else may need this more than me. =) Thanks lmn60 for thinking of me.

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

Taking to brunch meet-up

Picked up at brunch meet-up. I've heard much about Zadie Smith so I thought I'd have a crack at this book!