White Teeth

It's never a good sign when you are reading a book and you recognize a skippable paragraph (or few). By the last section I was skipping whole pages. The writing in this book is bloated and redundant that makes me wonder how long the first draft was or if it was edited at all. And there are quite a few stylistic writing choices. The worst one for me was persistently repeating what's already been said. This got really old really quickly. Why use one word when three would make you look stylish.

When you have 10+ main characters then none of them are given a chance to rise above the rest. Some characters even get introduced in last third of the book! and are given equal importance as the characters we've been following all along. Following is a strong word. You start a chapter with one character, get their back story and then you move on. In the next chapter a secondary character from the previous chapter gets the spotlight and the cycle continues to no end.

If reading pointless back stories about each (and every) character hasn't made you tear this book up then the lack of plot will surely push you over that ledge. It's supposed to be a multigenerational time-hopping story that spans decades. Story is also a strong word here because, other than the fact these people live with (or near) each other, there is no narrative string tying them together. Even though the author will make sure to tell you where each (and every) character has been, you don't get satisfaction of knowing where any of them are going. They are just thrown into random situations reminiscent of TV sitcoms and their stories serve more as a commentary about the life of (first and second generation) immigrants, rather than building blocks of a coherent storyline.

There is an attempt, at the very end, to merge each individual story into a crescendo but it's done clumsily and comes off as too little too late. By that point I just wanted the story to be over and couldn't care about the last-minute twist the author pulled out of her ass.