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 enlarge | Author: Joseph O'neill
Publisher: Pantheon
Category: Book
List Price: $23.95
Buy New: $15.48
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Rating:  73 reviews
Sales Rank: 266
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1
Pages: 272
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 5.5 x 1.2
ISBN: 0307377040
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.914
EAN: 9780307377043
ASIN: 0307377040
Publication Date: May 20, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand New, Perfect Condition, Please allow 4-14 business days for delivery. 100% Money Back Guarantee, Over 1,000,000 customers served.
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| Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 6-10 of 73
 Of New York, for New Yorkers December 28, 2008
D. C. Palter (Los Angeles, CA USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Netherland is a love story, where the love object is a post-9/11 New York City. Given a choice between staying in NYC and following his wife back to London, Hans stays for another two years, drinking in all that is NYC while adrift from his family.
I noticed that most of the 5 star reviews were from people in NYC. Similarly, of the 6 blurbs on the back cover, 5 were from distinctly New York publications (New York Times, NYT Review of Books, New Yorker, etc.) New Yorkers love their city, and 250 pages of praise of all of the wonders and wonderment of an outsiders view of NYC seems to strike a happy chord with them. As a non-New Yorker, though, I was mostly bored.
What little plot there is could be decribed in a paragraph, and it isn't relevant anyway. The writing is smooth and clean, but not particularly poetic or beautiful. Which leaves 250 pages describing how wonderful NYC is. If you recognize the places and people, you'll probably enjoy it. If not, then like me, you're likely to find it boring.
Straddling different worlds December 26, 2008
Rudolph Ten-pow (New York, USA)
As someone who has lived for varying periods in the Caribbean, the Netherlands and New York (in the latter, including on that fateful day in September 2001), for me O'Neill's "Netherland" has a particular resonance. In a curiously detached style reminiscent of Albert Camus's "The Outsider" and with extended flashbacks to his boyhood spent in The Hague, the narrator recounts a chapter of his life when the 9/11 attack triggers a process that leads to the disintegration of his domestic and emotional world and he seeks somewhat incongruously to rebuild alone a half-life in the immigrant subculture of West Indian and South Asian cricketers, who occupy a marginal niche in the New York sporting establishment. He portrays this immigrant world in the shadows of the city with the sympathy and conviction of one who has truly lived it. His personal journey, during which he loses and regains his wife and son, is no less compelling a story. Altogether a well-written and most memorable book.
 self-indulgent characters December 15, 2008
Thomas Ehrlich (Palo Alto, CA USA)
This novel has some elegant writing, but I was not able to feel any empathy for the characters. The protanganist, Hans, and his wife seemed totally self-indulgent, and the plot line was not strong enough to carry the book. In short, I was extremely disappointed in light of the strong reviews in the media.
 An English professor's dream? December 13, 2008
Colorado Reader
3 out of 7 found this review helpful
I should have counted the number of words I ought to have looked-up while reading Joseph O'Neil's "Netherland." They must have numbered at least one hundred. Not a bad trick to play on someone with a masters from an Ivy League university. Also, there were those inordinately complex sentences that I needed to reread at least three times to get their full meaning. Perhaps, an English professor's dream and the basis for an excellent literary essay. But the makings for a great novel? I think not, without a good plot and character development to back up those fancy words and sentences. I am perplexed why this book has been selected by The New York Times as one of the ten best books of the year and how it made the cut for the Man Booker Prize's long list. Apparently, all the reviewers were mesmerized by Mr. O'Neil's literary style to the point that they overlooked other ingredients normally associated with a good book. For me, "Netherland" was simply boring and pretentious. I plodded through to the end but then wondered why I had bothered.
I decided to read "Netherland" because it has been described as a post-9/11 novel. There are several references in this book to the emotional impact of 9/11 on New Yorkers and on the main character Hans whose wife uses the threat of future terrorist acts as a pretext to move back to London along with their son. A book that I found much richer in its discussion of 9/11 was "A Thousand Veils." It tells about a lawyer, totally immersed in the corporate greed of Wall Street, whose last-minute escape from the North Tower leads him to question his values and results in his life-changing decision to assist an Iraqi refugee. This is a much more satisfying solution than Hans' response in the aftermath of the crisis to bury himself in the game of cricket.
Fine little novel December 13, 2008
Anita
I bought this for an on line book club of fellow English teachers from around the US and Asia. It's an easy read with many similarities in language to F. Scott Fitzgerald. Lovely writing, with much of the story revolving around cricket (the part that turned some off) and 9/11. I liked it very much.
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