|
| Unaccustomed Earth | 
 enlarge | Author: Jhumpa Lahiri
Publisher: Knopf
Category: Book
List Price: $25.00
Buy New: $15.97
You Save: $9.03 (36%)
New (33) Used (21) Collectible (11) from $15.32
Avg. Customer Rating:  122 reviews
Sales Rank: 131
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 352
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 8.4 x 5.9 x 1.4
ISBN: 0307265730
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780307265739
ASIN: 0307265730
Publication Date: April 1, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
|
| Customer Reviews:
 Flawlessly written stories about regret April 4, 2008
29 out of 36 found this review helpful
There is nothing flashy about author Jhumpa Lahiri's writing. It's simply true. She writes flawlessly about secrets held close, about heartbreak and regret. At the end of each of these quiet stories, you feel an emotional wallop.
The characters invariably include a person or persons of Indian descent -- usually a Bengali. I was unfamiliar with Indian culture when I began reading Unaccustomed Earth, but it didn't hurt my enjoyment or understanding. The stories are universal. You only need to be human to relate to the characters and their situations.
My heart ached for these people, because I recognized them. The retired widower yearning for a new life. The silent mother hiding a broken heart. The charming brother giving in to weakness, ruining all that is good. These people could easily be my relatives, my closest of friends, or yours. Everyone has a secret to hide. Everyone regrets.
Although the stories are often sad, they always ring true. This book is an empathetic look at what it is to be human.
 A little disappointed April 11, 2008
20 out of 25 found this review helpful
As much as I admire Ms. Lahiri for her remarkable writing skills, I was disappointed with her new book. I've been a big fan of hers ever since I read 'The Interpreter of Maladies' but as I was reading 'The Namesake' and 'Unaccustomed Earth' over the past few years I could not help but feeling that her subject matters are very limited and characters are always the same. She seems to find the stories only from her own family and the range of her experiences is very narrow. It is still enjoyable to read her writings but it would be nice to read about something else, beyond her own family history (that is, stories about London-born, Americanized, Ivy-league educated young people of the Bengali origins)
 Poor writing June 24, 2008
14 out of 37 found this review helpful
Lahiri gets a free pass for having a Pulitzer and for being Indian-American. I find her writing altogether prosaic, with not a single paragraph worth lingering over. To be sure this is a biased opinion. On the other hand, I am surprised that nobody has noticed the lapses in grammar, syntax, idiom and vocabulary, and instances of plain silliness, that occur so frequently in her work as to nullify any credit she deserves for her narratives. Apparently Lahiri thinks little of the process of revision, a major preoccupation with good writers; certainly, she doesn't have an conscientious editor.
Here are things I found irksome in her first story :
P3 :Eurorail ; pensions
P4 :receive mail on his end
P5 :In a few months ... the trips would diminish.
P6 :waiting for the time to pass
P10 :nurtured inside of her
P23 :never one to be conversant during meals
P28 :In spite of his jet lag he had trouble falling asleep
P32 :opened up the cupboard
P33 :spouses dying within two years of one another
P37 :part time litigation ; the parking lot where the swimming pool was ; she told her father to wait on the benches.
P43 :It would be another four weeks until the amnio, allowing them to learn the sex.
P44 :buried things into the soil
P45 :While her father was in the shower, she made tea ; and the house was filled with silence.
P51 :the day before her father was scheduled to leave ; Saturday morning, ..., the garden was finished.
P55 :everything he'd purchased
P57 :to put a bill into the mail
This is poor writing indeed, by my standards. As for her literary skills, Lahiri writes like an author of non-fiction, telling us story and background without accepting the challenge of showing these.
Judging from the high praise in this forum, winning a Pulitzer has elevated Lahiri to being the spokesperson of the Indian-American experience and ethos. But for the accident of her birth, I find her to be neither particularly Indian nor particularly Bengali. With a few culinary adjustments, she could be writing about Turkish or Malaysian immigrants.
same old song.... April 25, 2008
13 out of 16 found this review helpful
From the first few words of Jhumpa's stunning first story, you know you are reading her.....the style is simple but very much hers.
I particularly loved the title story, and feel its her best yet. On the whole I liked this better than "Interpreter..."
I agree with one of the other reviewers however. As an Indian who moved here in the 90s, I'm stuck between the two generations of Indians (always refered to as Bengalis in her book...Bengalis happen to be from India but are known for a slight strain of chauvinsim, shall we say) she describes. I've adopted most of the ways of people who live here and still have ties to my home in India. I still can relate to their stories however. I just wish she would depart every once in a while and populate her stories with people who are slightly different. Maybe Indians with Blue Collar jobs or Gay Indians or whatever else. Jhumpa, you've lived here long enough to have been touched by people who didn't go to Harvard or Columbia, didn't grow up in affluent Boston suburbs and don't have perfect careers (but silent personal struggles)...
Its like I'm hearing variations of the same (albeit beautiful) song over and over again.
Unaccustomed praise April 26, 2008
13 out of 16 found this review helpful
Lahiri is a skilled storyteller. Her detailed descriptions and choreography of characters across time and place demonstrate her writing talent. At the same time, her frequent failure to develop characters we grow attached to - historically often the hallmark of great storytellers and writers - makes me question where her accolades originate from. Though, it's not as if there is no potential. I read 'Interpreter' when it first came out and was impressed. However, at that time the Indian immigrant story was a new genre, and Lahiri was a strong cut above the rest. Following the wave of the recycled 'immigrant struggle' story, I bypassed her first novel, 'Namesake', altogether and from what I heard I didn't miss much. I turned to this, her newest book, after some convincing. Unaccustomed earth was good enough to make hard to put down but still left me wanting.
I was left wondering why such a strong writer does not wish to, by her third book, use her ability to evoke emotion through her characters' personal relationships to also evoke a sense of familiarity among readers whose principal interactions are with people other than ivy-league graduates, upper class whites, white collar professionals, and globe trotters? This would bother me less, since Lahiri is probably fully concious of her character choices, if the media did not cast Lahiri as the authority on the Indian-American experience. The experience is so much larger than that which Lahiri portrays (including among Bengalis), yet her non-immigrant audience almost co-opts her writing to represent what they are comfortable with. None of the political ugliness that non-immigrant America needs to contend with is unearthed in Lahiri's work.
Strong stories in the book include 'Hell-Heaven' (which also appeared in the New Yorker around 2002) and 'Only Goodness'. 'A Choice of Accomodations' and 'Nobody's Business' much less so. The best part of this book comes in part two, the 'Hema and Kaushik' trilogy. This second part reveals what Lahiri is capable of. Her writing strength is on display here, as is her ability to build bonds between characters and readers. She connects readers to not only the immigrant experience, but complex personal emotions and contemporary events and phenomena that have shaped both immigrants' and non-immigrants' lives. It also has a stronger ending than many of the other stories in the book. Her accomplishment here leaves me wondering why she sacrifices so much in some of her other stories. The media's focus on her work actually does her harm in the end. It sets up unrealistic expectations for an otherwise solid writer. If Lahiri were to write an entire novel that captured the range of ability, emotions, and relevance as the 'Hema and Kaushik' trilogy, she could then righfully claim all that she has already been afforded.
|
|
|
Powered by Associate-O-Matic
| |
