N-W by Zadie Smith

I read White Teeth a very long time ago and loved it, then was disappointed in The Telegraph Man. However a bookshop person persuaded me to buy this book and I’m glad I did. This is no easy read. It’s a gritty book, a downer rather than an upper, but it has an almost anthropological ring to it, or perhaps a sociological ring might be a better word. It’s the story of four young people who have grown up and known one another on a council housing estate in northwest London. There are flashbacks to their childhood but essentially it’s about where they are now, in their thirties, and where if anywhere they are heading. It’s oddly constructed, first in chapters then in almost sound bites, and much of it written in the local street jargon. Smith makes the reader work hard to comprehend what’s going on; by that I mean she doesn’t spell things out and explain them, rather you have to be on your toes and really think about what a particular passage might be referring to. I came away from this novel feeling saddened but as if I had really experienced their lives in some small way. The blurb on the jacket described it as funny, sad and urgent – I think I’d change the order of those – but agree that it is an excellent portrait of modern city life for a particular slice of society. I found the book uncomfortable but compelling.