Waxwings

Resource Information

The work Waxwings represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in Chemeketa Cooperative Regional Library Service (CCRLS). This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.
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The Resource Waxwings

Label: Waxwings

Statement of responsibility: Jonathan Raban

Creator

trueRaban, Jonathan

Subject

Genre

Language: eng

Summary: A novel set in Seattle at the turn of the millennium follows two immigrants as they struggle to achieve the American dream in the midst of terrorism, economic fireworks, and unrest in the streets

Tone

Writing style

trueWitty

Award: New York Times Notable Book, 2003

Review

Two disparate characters come together under unusual circumstances in this novel of Seattle during the start-up Internet gold rush of the 1990s. Hungarian-born Tom, a self-absorbed English professor and regular commentator for NPR, finds himself with a floundering marriage and an emotionally disturbed son--two situations he cannot comprehend. Chick is a recent Chinese immigrant who entered the country in a metal container with 30 other men, barely escaping the INS. He finds shady construction work and is dedicated to becoming a successful American citizen, even running his own off-the-books construction business. The two men form an unlikely partnership when Chick appears on Tom’s lawn, practically forcing Tom to hire his motley crew to repair Tom’s roof. Chick squats in Tom’s basement and provides support when Tom is questioned as a suspect in the disappearance of a child. Readers will be intrigued with Chick and his experiences finding work, living quarters, and a legal identity. Slow to start, the story gets up to speed almost halfway through and peters out occasionally until the end. -- Kaite Mediatore (BookList, 10-01-2003, p301)
/* Starred Review */ A Hungarian-born British expatriate settled in dot-com–frenzied Seattle is the bemused protagonist of this inspired jumble of a novel, travel writer Raban's first since 1985's Foreign Land . Tom Janeway is a professor of writing, a novelist and a public radio commentator; his wife, Beth, works for GetaShack.com, a startup providing virtual neighborhood tours for prospective house buyers. They have a four-year-old son named Finn, and they appear content. Behind the happy façade, though, Beth has grown deeply unhappy with her self-absorbed husband, his immersion in books and his pretentious radio voice ("his fucking rolled r 's")—she hankers after expensive cars, a bright new condo and honest attention. Unfolding in counterpoint to Raban's chronicle of the rather civilized collapse of their marriage is the story of a shady Chinese immigrant called Chick; he survives a horrific journey to America and becomes an off-the-books contractor who bullies Tom into employing him to renovate their gloomy old house after Beth moves out. Beneath the surface, larger currents are swirling, and Tom is suddenly swept up in them when he goes for a walk on a local nature trail and is misidentified as a suspect in a series of child murders. Chick's unpredictable antics sharpen the sense of menace, while a subplot about an egotistical British novelist who is considering a residency at Tom's college provides effective comic relief. Raban's caustic, affectionate commentary on the manic gyrations of millennial America unites these disparate plot lines, making his novel a wry paean to the cluttered, freewheeling lives led by the motley residents of an immigrant nation. (Sept. 30) Forecast: Raban, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1996 for Bad Land, is a Brit expatriate and Seattle resident himself. Waxwings was just shortlisted for the Booker, and should attract considerable attention as the author's first novel in nearly 20 years. Eight-city author tour. --Staff (Reviewed September 1, 2003) (Publishers Weekly, vol 250, issue 35, p65)
From Bad Land to Passage to Juneau , Raban's perennial theme is the immigrant experience. This work, set in Seattle in the late 1990s, intertwines the lives of two immigrants at opposite ends of the social scale. The perfect life of British expatriate Tom Janeway starts to unravel when his wife takes a lucrative job with an Internet start-up. She buys a new car and a new condo and then files for divorce. In short order, Tom loses his teaching position at the university and his job as an NPR commentator. Chick, Tom's Chinese counterpart, is smuggled into the United States in a shipping container crowded with illegals. Within a few months, he is supervising his own crew of undocumented workers, repairing roofs in Tom's upscale neighborhood. Waxwings succeeds as a sharply observed satire of the Internet boom and as a bittersweet meditation on the American dream but is somewhat less successful as a Dickensian portrait of Seattle. Recommended for larger fiction collections and for libraries with a strong interest in the Pacific Northwest. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 5/15/03.]—Edward B. St. John, Loyola Law Sch. Lib., Los Angeles --Edward B. St. John (Reviewed September 15, 2003) (Library Journal, vol 128, issue 15, p93)
/* Starred Review */ British-born Raban (Passage to Juneau, 1999, etc.) sends a poison-pen letter to his adopted homeland in this witty account of America at the turn of the millennium.The tale is set in Seattle, where expatriate English novelist Tom Janeway pontificates on NPR's All Things Considered and teaches writing at the University of Washington while his hotshot wife Beth counts returns on the IPO of her Internet realty business, GetaShack.com. The riots that recently marred the 1999 WTO conference have led the mayor to cancel all New Year's Eve celebrations, but for the most part (Y2K fears notwithstanding) everyone is looking forward to the new century with very little dread. Even Chick Lee, an illegal immigrant from China who nearly died as a stowaway on a container ship, has been able to evade the INS and make a decent living for himself as a day laborer in the boom economy. But there are intimations that the party may be winding down—not least being the arrest of an al-Quaeda terrorist caught trying to cross the border in a car full of explosives. And Tom's private life becomes a tangle of complications in short order. First, Beth (stung by some flippant remarks Tom made about the dot.com economy on one of his radio spots) leaves him, taking their four-year-old son Finn with her. Then Tom is identified as a suspect in a string of missing-persons' cases because he happened to be hiking in the woods where one of the missing was last seen. Meanwhile, Chick sets himself up as a contractor and brings a gang of Mexican illegals over to fix Tom's roof—just as the police investigation is heating up. Is the bubble about to burst? Or is Tom just going through a rough patch? We know, of course, but Tom doesn't.Sharper (and a lot faster) than The Bonfire of the Vanities, may well be one of the best accounts ever written of an American era. (Kirkus Reviews, August 1, 2003)

Cataloging source: DLC

Dewey number: 823/.914

Index: no index present

LC call number: PR6068.A22

LC item number: W39 2003

Literary form: fiction

Context

Context of Waxwings

Context

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