Customer Reviews: Read 72 more reviews...
 Unaccustomed praise? July 8, 2008
Thiele M. Redmond (Ross, Ca USA)
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
...not by today's standards! I have read this author's earlier work and actually enjoyed some of the stories in her collection from a few years back. But deserving of a Pulitzer? In all fairness, I must say that it seems as though one must now be ethnic and from a Third World country to get any literary recognition in this fair United States these days. I'd say this might be a good thing if these writers were really coming from difficulty and struggle. But that is not the case with these ethnic immigrant writers of today. If one is as privileged as Ms. Lahiri has been, (and there are many), you will go to the correct top tier Ivy League schools, which will give you correct entry to the publishing circle elite. Let me just say that I welcome varied experience; I am all for different perspectives-but what's missing here is the grit of life. We can't help but see that Lahiri's dramas are rather predictable, shallow and simply not constituting the very stuff of which great fiction is made.
To wit: the greatest writers, to me, never entered an MFA program or Ivy League type of school. I think this is true today as any. Could you imagine Henry Miller, Mark Twain, Dickenson, Gogol, Austen, Whitman, George Eliot et al, coming out of the precious Iowa School or any other assortment of MFA programs? I think not. What constitutes such a lustrous and exquisite rendering of life is life itself. And those great writers lived it. Sad to say this no longer seems to be the case. And our expectations are so lowered as a result of it.
Some of my favorite books this year are from writers who are not granted such recognition as this one is. For starters, check out the lesser known, SIM0N LAZARUS, a breath-taking story I can't stop thinking about.
 Something for everyone! June 30, 2008
Book Dork (Southern California)
2 out of 5 found this review helpful
Jhumpa Lahiri's new collection of stories detail the lives of several Bengalis learning to combine their heritage with American culture. Compromise and balance are imperative when approaching the variety of issues these characters encounter, including friendship, romantic relationships, morality, education and family values. Even seemingly minor parts of life, including dress and food, are examined, as they are very significant to the Indian identity. Generational differences are on the forefront of each story; many characters were either born in the United States or came to the country when they were young, making them identify more with the American culture they have been surrounded by. These struggles are visible in every story, but are tailored to fit the individual characters and their lives.
Part one of the collection is made up of five stories. My favorite was "Unaccustomed Earth" in which the perspective is alternated between a newly widowed man who visits his middle-aged, pregnant daughter. She feels obligated to allow him to move in with her family (her Caucasian husband has even agreed) but is reluctant to ask. The father knows the request is coming but doesn't want to accept, content with his life of travel and new (secret) girlfriend. Over the course of his visit the two grow closer, learning more about each other in just a few days than they had over an entire lifetime. The other stories are also fantastic, Lahiri expertly crafting characters with depth.
Part two consists of three stories that are connected to each other, told by a man and a woman whose relationship goes back to childhood, when their families temporarily lived together. The three stories tell about their separate lives and how they are once again brought together as adults.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone. There's so many layers that everyone can identify with something in it, even if they're not Indian (I'm not!) Themes such as cultural identity, love and family apply to everyone. Lahiri has obviously decided to write about Bengalis; some people have a problem with this. What does it matter? The characters and their stories are fresh and insightful , and the writing is beautiful. Would we ask a surgeon to do someone's taxes? A dance instructor to run a construction crew? Probably not; let a writer write what they know, especially if they do it well!
 More of the same June 25, 2008
R. Das (Marlton, NJ USA)
4 out of 8 found this review helpful
Lahiri needs to branch out of her comfort zone and write a story that goes beyond the account of Bengali-Americans trying to adjust to new frontiers. Enough already. The writing is narrative at best. For truly evocative writing on a similar theme, read Monica Ali's Brick Lane.
Poor writing June 24, 2008
PBS (PA USA)
7 out of 17 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.
Another Great Collection of Stories from Lahiri June 23, 2008
M. D. Brook (Boston, MA USA)
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
It's refreshing to anxiously anticipate each of Lahiri's books and be so completely fulfilled by the product. Each of the stories in Unaccustomed Earth evokes new and refreshing insight into the human condition.
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