Showing results by author "Joseph O' Neill" in All Categories

The author of the best-selling and award-winning Netherland now gives us his eagerly awaited, stunningly different new novel: a tale of alienation and heartbreak in Dubai. Distraught by a breakup with his long-term girlfriend, our unnamed hero leaves New York to take an unusual job in a strange desert metropolis. In Dubai at the height of its self-invention as a futuristic Shangri-la, he struggles with his new position as the "family officer" of the capricious and very rich Batros family.

Alone and un-tethered, feeling lost in the country he had come to regard as home, Hans stumbles upon the vibrant New York subculture of cricket, where he revisits his lost childhood and, thanks to a friendship with a charismatic and charming Trinidadian named Chuck Ramkissoon, begins to reconnect with his life and his adopted country. Ramkissoon, a Gatsby-like figure who is part idealist and part operator, introduces Hans to an "other" New York populated by immigrants and strivers of every race and nationality.

"Spectacular" is a mild word for describing the strange experiment with life that comprises the story of Nikola Tesla, and "amazing" fails to do adequate justice to the results that burst from his experiences like an exploding rocket. It is the story of the dazzling scintillations of a superman who created a new world.

Mark Wolfe, a brilliant if self-thwarting technical writer, lives in Pittsburgh with his wife, Sushila, and their toddler daughter. His half-brother Geoff, born and raised in the United Kingdom, is a desperate young soccer agent. He pulls Mark across the ocean into a scheme to track down an elusive prospect known only as “Godwin”—an African teenager Geoff believes could be the next Lionel Messi.

From bourgeois facial-hair trends to parental sleep deprivation, Joseph O’Neill closely observes the mores of his characters, whose vacillations and second thoughts expose the mysterious pettiness, underlying violence, and, sometimes, surprising beauty of ordinary life in the early 21st century. A lonely wedding guest talks to a goose; two poets struggle over whether to participate in a “pardon Edward Snowden” verse petition; a cowardly husband lets his wife face a possible intruder in their home; a potential co-op renter in NYC can’t find anyone to give him a character reference.

What do you do when your wife takes your child and leaves you alone in a city of ghosts? Dutch banker Hans ver den Broek chooses cricket. But New York cricket is a long way from the tranquil sport he grew up with. It's a rough, almost secret game, played in scrubby marginal urban parks by people the city doesnt see - people like Chuck Ramkissoon.

Mark Wolfe, a brilliant if self-thwarting technical writer, lives in Pittsburgh with his wife, Sushila, and their toddler daughter. His half-brother Geoff, born and raised in the UK, is a desperate young soccer agent. He pulls Mark across the ocean into a scheme to track down an elusive prospect known only as “Godwin” – an African teenager Geoff believes could be the next Messi.

Back at dinner, somebody said that the goose thinks it’s a dog. No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t think it’s a dog. The goose doesn’t think. The goose just is. And what the goose is is goose. But goose is not goose, Robert thinks. Even the goose isn’t goose. In Good Trouble, the first story collection from Joseph O’Neil, author of Netherland, characters are forced to discover exactly who they are - and who they can never quite be.

Cameras that can see through your clothes at 80 paces; council tax rising to cover increased CCTV needs; suggestions that Internet Service Providers should monitor customer usage in the comfort of their own homes; plus ID cards, fingerprint and eyeball recognition on the horizon. In the 21st century is there anywhere to hide? And if not, should there be? Big Brother: Who is watching you? twitches the curtain and takes a hard look at our increasingly hi-tech, zero privacy society.

The new novel from Joseph O'Neill, his first since the Man Booker longlisted and PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction-winning Netherland. In 2007, a New York attorney bumps into an old college buddy - and accepts his friend's offer of a job in Dubai, as the overseer of an enormous family fortune. Haunted by the collapse of his relationship and hoping for a fresh start, our strange hero begins to suspect that he has exchanged one inferno for another.