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Description
A stunningly inventive, deeply moving fiction debut: stories that take us from the slums of Colombia to the streets of Tehran; from New York City to Iowa City; from a tiny fishing village in Australia to a foundering vessel in the South China Sea, in a masterly display of literary virtuosity... read more
Summary
Young former Melbourne corporate lawyer turns hundreds of other young, former Melbourne corporate lawyers green with envy by publishing a phenomenally successful collection of nuanced and beautiful short stories.
Memorable Quotes
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“Other friends were more forthright: “I’m sick of ethnic lit,” one said. “It’s full of descriptions of exotic food.” Or: “You can’t tell if the language is spare because the author intended it that way, or because he didn’t have the vocab.” I was told about a friend of a friend, a Harvard graduate from Washington, D.C., who had posed in traditional Nigerian garb for his book-jacket photo. I pictured myself standing in a rice paddy, wearing a straw conical hat. Then I pictured my father in the same field, wearing his threadbare fatigues, young and hard-eyed. “It’s a license to bore,” my friend said. We were drunk and walking our bikes because both of us, separately, had punctured our tires on the way to the party. “The characters are always flat, generic. As long as a Chinese writer writes about Chinese people, or a Peruvian writer about Peruvians, or a Russian writer about Russians …” he said, as though reciting children’s doggerel, then stopped, losing his train of thought.”
First Sentence
Table of Contents
Authors & Contributors
- Nam Le (Author)
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