Brick Lane: Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize - Softcover

Ali, Monica

3.45

33,657 ratings by Goodreads

9780552151597: Brick Lane: Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0552151599 ISBN 13: 9780552151597

Publisher: Black Swan, 2003

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'Focusing on a cross-section of the Bangladeshi community in Tower Hamlets, a community all but invisible to the rest of London, Ali's novel is warm, shrewd, startling, and hugely readable; the sort of book you race through greedily.' OBSERVER

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Review:

With its gritty Tower Hamlets setting, this sharply observed contemporary novel about the life of an Asian immigrant girl deals cogently with issues of love, cultural difference and the human spirit. The pre-publicity hype about Brick Lane was precisely the kind to set alarm bells ringing (we've heard it so often before), but, for once, the excitement is fully justified: Monica Ali's debut novel demonstrates that there is a new voice in modern fiction to be reckoned with.

Nazneen is a teenager forced into an arranged marriage with a man considerably older than her--a man whose expectations of life are so low that misery seems to stretch ahead for her. Fearfully leaving the sultry oppression of her Bangladeshi village, Nazneen finds herself cloistered in a small flat in a high-rise block in the East End of London. Because she speaks no English, she is obliged to depend totally on her husband. But it becomes apparent that, of the two, she is the real survivor: more able to deal with the ways of the world, and a better judge of the vagaries of human behaviour. She makes friends with another Asian girl, Razia, who is the conduit to her understanding of the unsettling ways of her new homeland.

This is a novel of genuine insight, with the kind of characterisation that reminds the reader at every turn just what the novel form is capable of. Every character (Nazneen, her disappointed husband and her resourceful friend Razia) is drawn with the complexity that can really only be found in the novel these days. In some ways, the reader is given the same all-encompassing experience as in a Dickens novel: humour and tragedy rub shoulders in a narrative that inexorably grips the reader. Whether or not Monica Ali can follow up this achievement is a question for the future; it's enough to say right now that Brick Lane is an essential read for anyone interested in current British fiction. --Barry Forshaw

Review:

"'The new rising star of English fiction post Zadie Smith ... Highly recommended.'" (Marie Claire)

"'Monica Ali is a fabulous writer, and Brick Lane is finely observed, deeply compassionate, wry and tender.'" (Meera Syal)

"'A very special novel - I adored it. It gave me everything I crave in a novel ... You won't publish a better novel in 2003.'" (Margaret Forster)

"'A very special novel - I adored it. It gave me everything I crave in a novel - entertaining, moving and fascinating.'" (Margaret Forster)

"'Entertaining and full of insight ... talented, thoughtful and mature.'" (Hilary Mantel)

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