When I read this originally, not long after it was published in 2013, I remember enjoying it up to a point and I gave it a 3* rating. 10 years plus on I think I’m a more mature reader and a less tolerant one, so I’ve dropped a star. I found it much harder to relate to this time and got impatient with it. The story follows four Londoners as they leave behind the council estate they grew up on and forge new and separate paths for themselves in the metropolis. The narrative is disjointed and episodic and sometimes hard to follow. I found the characters hard to relate to or identify with and most of the time I simply wasn’t interested in their self-obsessed and solipsistic lives. It’s not always clear who’s speaking, and the street slang becomes wearing. I certainly didn’t find it funny at all. Not for me, this one.

A classic for a reason. Hard to know what to say about this one that hasn't been said before. Will remain in the canon.

Not my favorite by Zadie Smith but a well written and well plotted book. Sometimes I found hard to related to the characters but I appreciated the plot and the storytelling
A good book that aged well
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine

NW follows the lives of four people; Leah, Natalie, Nathan and Felix, who all live in the north west of London. This book describes how their lives diverge after they've left their childhood council estate and explores issues relating to family, race and class.

I've been seeing Zadie Smith's books everywhere for the past couple of years so was really excited to read this. Unfortunately this book really didn't work for me. This book is set in the north west of London which is an area that I am unfamiliar with so I found large chunks of this book difficult to understand or relate to. My main issue with this book lies in the writing style which felt very muddled and was extremely hard to follow. For example the lack of speech marks or indications as to who is speaking made the dialogue make no sense. I also found that the author kept going off on overly descriptive tangents of the tiniest details which made this tedious to read and quite difficult to follow.

Overall this book really wasn't for me however if you are someone who has a better knowledge of the area this book may be more enjoyable for you.

I am very glad that I got to read this book as I didn't read it when it came out so I reqlly enjoyed it.

I never read this book first time around so took the opportunity to read it via Netgalley which I thoroughly enjoyed.