Unwilling to admit that he has entered into middle age, successful psychoanalyst and divorced father Jamal interacts with a string of outcast friends while struggling with memories about his first love, from whom he had been separated by an unconfessed act of violence. By the author of The Buddha of Suburbia. 40,000 first printing.
Blackwell North Amer
Jamal is middle-aged, though reluctant to admit it. He has an ex-wife, a son he adores, a thriving career as a psychoanalyst and vast reserves of unsatisfied desire. "Secrets are my currency," he says. "I deal in them for a living." And he has some of his own. He is haunted by Ajita, his first love, whom he hasn't seen in decades, and by an act of violence he has never confessed.
Hanif Kureishi has created an array of unforgettable characters - a hilarious and eccentric theater director, a covey of charming and defiant outcasts and an ebullient sister who thrives on the fringe. All wrestle with their own limits as human beings; all are plagued by the past until they find it within themselves to forgive.
Baker
& Taylor
Unwilling to admit that he has entered middle age, successful psychoanalyst and divorced father Jamal interacts with a string of outcast friends while struggling with memories about his first love, from whom he was separated by an unconfessed act of violence.
Simon and Schuster
THE STUNNINGLY ORIGINAL, ICONOCLASTIC, AWARD-WINNING AUTHOR OF THE BUDDHA OF SUBURBIA RETURNS WITH HIS FINEST, MOST EXUBERANT NOVEL.
In the early 1980s Hanif Kureishi emerged as one of the most compelling new voices in film and fiction. His movies My Beautiful Laundrette and Sammy and Rosie Get Laid and his novel The Buddha of Suburbia captivated audiences and inspired other artists. In Something to Tell You, he travels back to those days of hedonism, activism and glorious creativity. And he explores the lives of that generation now, in a very different London.
Jamal is middle-aged, though reluctant to admit it. He has an ex-wife, a son he adores, a thriving career as a psychoanalyst and vast reserves of unsatisfied desire. "Secrets are my currency," he says. "I deal in them for a living." And he has some of his own. He is haunted by Ajita, his first love, whom he hasn't seen in decades, and by an act of violence he has never confessed.
With great empathy and agility, Kureishi has created an array of unforgettable characters -- a hilarious and eccentric theater director, a covey of charming and defiant outcasts and an ebullient sister who thrives on the fringe. All wrestle with their own limits as human beings; all are plagued by the past until they find it within themselves to forgive.
Comic, wise and unfailingly tender, Something to Tell You is Kureishi's best work to date, brilliant and exhilarating.
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Add a CommentI'm always interested in psychology and this story had an interesting underlying weave of musings about psychoanalysis, intellectual authors, philosophers, and the heartbreaks of love and relationships, without pulling anything out like a lesson. I appreciated the subtle hints to forecast what would happen to Jamal as the story progressed, and the subtle introductions, first in small pieces, of what happened in his past, revealed more in depth later in the novel. A couple of the plot twists I saw coming a mile away (Jamal love interest Ajita's truth about her relationship with her father is one example), but for the most part I was happily surprised as characters developed. The sexual material is at times edgy, but I interpreted this as an essential part of several characters' story arcs to explore how they felt about commitment, what is acceptable as pleasure, aging with sexual needs, and it was fairly entertaining to read. I also enjoyed the contemporary Brit feel of the book, with the language, multi-cultural elements, and yet some characters experience profound racial otherness while living in modern London. All things not in my personal experience, but I find enjoyable in a book.
About Jamal, who is a physchoanalyst, who tells us about his life when growing up in the 60s, 70s, and then jumps back to his current life with his ex-wife and son. While he still pines for his first love. Ajita, and struggles with an event of a murder he was involved with in his younger years. He hangs out with his eccentric sister, Miriam, and his best friend, Henry, who is a pompous arse. Found some of the scenes explicit (just didn't need to know) and the characters were colorful, but nothing I could connect with or enjoyed.