Netherland: A Novel
by Joseph O'Neill
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Book Reviews of Netherland: A Novel
Book Review: Lyrical and flexible prose captures relationships and sports
Summary: 4 Stars
Netherland is the story of a couple (Hans and Rachel) living in New York City with their young son. After the September 11th terrorist attacks, Rachel moves back to England where she's from with their son, claiming she can't raise a child in such a "diseased" country. After being left behind in NYC by his family, Hans immerses himself in the city's cricket subculture and befriends Chuck Ramkissoon, a Trinidadian entrepreneur who dabbles in shady enterprises and referees cricket matches on the side.
O'Neill's lyrical and flexible prose captures the nuanced complexity of intimate relationships with as much success as it describes the various strokes available to a batter in a cricket game ("the glance, the hook, the cut, the sweep, the cover drive, the pull and all those other offspring of technique conceived to send the cricket ball rolling and rolling, as if by magic, to the far-off edge of the playing field"). O'Neill's prose is the best part of this book.
The vivid character of Ramkissoon is the second best part of this book. Ramkissoon dreams of building a world-class cricket arena in Brooklyn and thinks cricket has the power to save the world. Despite his sentimental ideas, or maybe because of them, Ramkissoon is wholly authentic and believable. The character of Rachel, however, is not quite so well conceived. Although O'Neill accurately describes the unsettled feeling felt by many New Yorkers after September 11th, Rachel's abandonment of her marriage and escape back to England feels more like a plot device than a credible response.
This slim novel tackles many big themes, including marriage (its failure and its resurrection), happiness, September 11th and its aftereffects, sports (literally and as an analogy for human fellowship), and friendship. There's even an unsolved murder mystery. This unique and sensitive melding of stories offers something for everyone, but the book occasionally attempts too much. Certain underdeveloped threads and loose ends cause Netherland to fall short of a masterpiece.
Book Review: A Narrator You Can Trust
Summary: 5 Stars
This fine novel about contemporary urban life owes its strength to the sureness of its narrator, Hans van den Broek, a Dutchman, married to a Brit, who works on Wall Street. The family is displaced from its home downtown by the terrorist attacks of 2001, but that's more in the background than the thriving life that Hans discovers among other cricket playing immigrants on the playing fields of the outer burroughs.
Early in the novel, Hans gives away two important pieces of information: his wife left him and took their son to London while he lived alone in New York, and Chuck Ramkissoon, his Trinidadian friend from the cricket field and various other excursions, is dead, probably of foul play. While cricket runs through the whole narrative, you don't have to be a sports fan to appreciate O'Neill's game descriptions, which brim with social insight.
Michiko Kakutani compared this novel to Scott Fitzgerald's Gatsby, and I think she was correct about the poetry of the narrative (I read many passages several times, and was moved especially by the closing pages), but author Joseph O'Neill has none of Fitzgeralds's hunger and envy of the rich. Hans may be comfortable on Wall Street, but he's not driven, nor does he feel entitled. Unlike his wife, a lawyer who thinks in practicalities but is out of touch with her feelings, he realizes that she balances his all too easy-going willingness to be led down the garden path by his curiosity and suspension of judgment.
I loved O'Neill's careful observation of place, whether New York or London or Trivandrum, India, or The Hague. In New York, his character lives in the Chelsea Hotel, whose present ambiance he nails. Another very funny scene is set in the chaos of the crowds around Macy's on Thanksgiving.
But most of all, I came to care about these characters, because the author does, and that makes me wonder what their lives hold and what we can expect next from O'Neill.
Book Review: Striving to deliver an objective review...
Summary: 2 Stars
170 pages into Netherland, I had a crisis of faith... I wasn't sure if I was meant to be a reader. This may sound strange as I typically read 6 books a month encompassing a variety of genres. This book though really tested my faith in my perceptions of good literature. Here's the problem with Netherland--It's billed as a great American novel, the modern equivalent of The Great Gatsby. Talk about high expectations! Hans is the narrator of the story, a quiet hard-working conscious character who in his lack of solidity is a perfect everyman. This would be perfectly fine except the book is told from his view and his lifeless blandness tinges everything with the color of ambivalence. Hans never came to life for me, and all of the other characters were just minor bit parts circling around him, Chuck included, whose befriending of Hans is the driving narrative of the book. As many reviewers have said, there was alot of discussion of cricket (of which I know nothing about it; maybe one reason I couldn't become fully engaged) and alot of driving around Brooklyn and Queens. One thing O'Neill does well is capture the reality of living in NYC perfectly--the people, the tone, the culture. It's spot on. But is this enough to make a good read? I wonder if all the people who gave great reviews are just die-hard NYers who are applauding O'Neill's ability to put this great city's heart down on paper. For me, I started to despair on p. 170 when I realized there might never be a plot or a crescendo or a denouement. I realized that I might actually have spent 170 pages reading a book which though elegantly phrased at times gave me relatively little insight into my own existence and which furthermore didn't even have a good story. I'm happy to report that I finished Netherland last night and no, the ending didn't make up for it. I'm just relieved it's over and I can move on to something good to read.Book Review: Breathtaking and Brilliant
Summary: 5 Stars
'Netherland' is one of the finest books I have read in the past several years. Its prose is beautifully crafted. Its structure complex and satisfying. Its story deep and meditative. You will think of it for weeks after you have read its last sentences.
'Netherland' is a post-911 book. Set after the catastrophe, a Dutch born equities analyst named Hans, and Rachel his English barrister wife are pushed out of their lower Manhattan home. They take up an unsatisfactory residence in the Chelsea Hotel. Rachel decides that she must return to England with their young son. The obstensible reason is that New York is no longer safe. However, on a deeper level their marriage is unraveling. The story focuses on Hans as he struggles to come to terms with the sense of dislocation he feels in the wake of his wife and son's departure. He meanders around New York City when he is not working amidst the hordes of immigrants who populate the City, and he becomes involved with the charismatic and enigmatic Chuck Ramkissoon when he decides to take up cricket once again, the beloved game of his youth. Cricket becomes a metaphor for the dislocation of the foreigner in American, and Chuck's desire to build a cricket stadium and begin a fad for cricket in America becomes a symbol of the New American Dream.
As Fitzgerald's " The Great Gatsby' is the novel of the American Dream of his time, "Neverland" is a paen to the New American Dream of the post 911 world. In shifting time perspectives we are taken to Brooklyn, a 'netherland' of new immigrants; to The Hague where Hans was born; to modern day post 911 London and to the Trinidad of the young Chuck Ramkissoon. This brilliant novel challenges our notions of America's place in the world, and our notions of love and forgiveness
Definitely a most read. It can be compared with Ian McEwan's recent novel 'Saturday'.
Book Review: The invincible city of the dreams
Summary: 5 Stars
Joseph O'Neill's "Netherland" opens quoting Whitman, a verse in which the poet dreams of a city invincible to attacks of the rest of the Earth, and it was `the new City of Friend'. Throughout the novel, these lines are, of course, related to the New York city and its life in the post-9/11.
On the surface this, strange as it may sound, a novel about cricket - but on another level this is a deep search for identity in the middle of the chaos, emotional and otherwise of one character, namely Hans van den Broek. The game is his refuge he finds back in his childhood. But, as the world, the sport is not as gentle and sweet as it used to be. Nowadays it is tougher and rougher, something virtually secret played by strange people.
As the narrative advances, O'Neill seems to interconnect both the game and Van den Broek's life in troubled times. But as the writer once told in an interview what is vital for him is the voice - more than a plot or anything. In this sense, "Netherland" is a novel of strong voice with distinct moments and tones.
As it has already largely been said, "Netherland" has a strong dialogue with F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby". Here there is a sort of farewell to that world portrayed in that Jazz Age novel. In O'Neill's book, the idea of nation - or better, of being an American - is in question. These are other times, times of Globalization, when one does not need to live in the United States to feel the `American Experience', or something like it.
In his life, the protagonist of this novel will experiment New York city in different levels, with different responses. Sometimes, Whitman's the city of friends, other times, the city of the lost souls, and on others, the city of fear or joy. Either way, this is a place where the eyes of the world never quit looking, admiring.