Author:Nell Freudenberger
From Nell Freudenberger, one of America's most dazzling talents, comes an utterly captivating cross-continental love story
Amina Mazid is twenty-four when she leaves Bangladesh for Rochester, New York, and for George Stillman, the husband who met and wooed her online. It's a twenty-first-century romance that echoes ancient traditions - the arranged marriages of her home country. And though George falls for Amina because she doesn't 'play games', they will both hide a secret, and vital, part of their lives from each other.
A brilliantly observed, wry and yet deeply moving novel about the exhilerations - and complications - of getting, and staying, wed, The Newlyweds is a tour de force - a novel as rich with misunderstandings as it is with unlikely connections.
'Young writers as ambitious - and as good - as Nell Freudenberger give us reason for hope', New York Times Book Review
'Freudenberg has rare humanity, and talent great enough to command not only a vast landscape of imbalance and misunderstanding, but also a tender sphere of tiny intimacy, hidden yearning...A marvellous book', Kiran Desai, winner of the MAN Booker Prize for The Inheritance of Loss
Nell Freudenberger is the author of the novel The Dissident, (longlisted for the Orange Prize), The Lessons and the story collection Lucky Girls, winner of the PEN/Malamud Award and shortlisted for the Orange New Writers' Prize and a New York Times Book Review Notable Book. She was named a New Yorker '20 Under 40' writer and one of Granta's Best Young American Novelists. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.
Took off like a rocket, taking me with it
—— The TimesA convincing and rather compelling story of a very modern marriage and a real heroine to root for
—— Daily MailA wonderful, funny, inventive novel that takes you slowly by surprise the more you read. Highly recommended
—— Red (Book of the Month)The intrigue and small disappointments of marriage are painstakingly captured.
—— PsychologiesA Fresh and modern look at relationships, told with heart.
—— ElleA charming and serious tale of marriage, family and identity. Its prose style is intimate, almost conspiratorial... threading its arm around the reader confidently. The writing is clear and spare... yet Freudenberger's investigation into what makes relationships work... is complex and sophisticated... Freudenberger approaches her subject with great sensitivity, a heavy sense of the seriousness of life - and much wry humour.
—— Independent on SundayThere are some piercing cultural observations... the chapters zip along with purpose and the novel flits effortlessly between the false intimacy of suburban America and the closely knit gossipy communities of Dhaka
—— IndependentA powerful sense of empathy, of being able to imagine what it is to be soemone else, to feel what someone else feels
—— Mohsin HamidEvery minute I was away from this book I was longing to be back in the world she created
—— Ann Patchett, author of 'State of Wonder'This classic tale of missed chances, crushing errors of judgment, and scarring sacrifices, all compounded by cultural differences, is perfectly pitched, piercingly funny, and exquisitely heartbreaking
—— Booklist starred reviewWise, timely, ripe with humour and complexity, The Newlyweds is one of the most believable love stories of our young century
—— Gary Shteyngart, author of 'Super Sad True Love Story'Genuinely laugh out loud
—— Daily MailUtterly now
—— Claire Allfree , MetroAmbitious, assured and ruthlessly controlled…exhilarating
—— Richard Beck , ProspectHow Should a Person Be? is a question to be revisited by the author herself, or another writer, or many other writers – but it’s also the question novels were invented to respond to… Sheila makes it ugly to clear a space: for novels to be less fictional, for women to dream of being geniuses, for a way of being 'honest and transparent and give away nothing'
—— Joanna Briggs , London Review of BooksA timely, gloriously messy, openhearted, clever and beautiful new thing
—— Dazed & ConfusedAn unconventional blur of fact and fiction, How Should a Person Be? is an engaging cocktail of memoir, novel and self-help guide
—— GraziaA candid collection of taped interviews and emails, random notes and daring exposition…fascinating
—— Sinead Gleeson , Irish TimesProvocative, funny and original
—— Hannah Rosefield , Literary ReviewA serious work about authenticity, how to lead a moral life and accept one’s own ugliness
—— Richard Godwin , Evening StandardAn exuberantly productive mess, filtered and reorganised after the fact...rather than working within a familiar structure, Heti has gone out to look for things that interest her and "put a fence around" whatever she finds
—— Lidija Haas , Times Literary SupplementA sharp, witty exploration of relationships, art and celebrity culture
—— Natasha Lehrer , Jewish Chronicle[Sheila Heti] has an appealing restlessness, a curiosity about new forms, and an attractive freedom from pretentiousness or cant…How Should a Person Be? offers a vital and funny picture of the excitements and longueurs of trying to be a young creator in a free, late-capitalist Western City…This talented writer may well have identified a central dialectic of twenty-first-century postmodern being
—— James Wood, New YorkerFunny…odd, original, and nearly unclassifiable…Sheila Heti does know something about how many of us, right now, experience the world, and she has gotten that knowledge down on paper, in a form unlike any other novel I can think of
—— New York TimesPlayful, funny... absolutely true
—— The Paris ReviewSheila's clever, openhearted commentary will draw wry smiles from readers empathetic to modern life's trials and tribulations
—— Eve Commander , Big Issue in the NorthAmusing and original
—— Mail on Sunday