Kapitoil

Apr 28, 2012 Lorenzo rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: aaa-my-library, american, 2012-readings

It's hard to find a single drop of oil in "Kapitoil", but this doesn't mean you shouldn't read this novel.

Yes, I'm talking to you bankers, speculators, brokers, financial advisers, oligarchs, sheiks, Russian PMs and Iranian presidents, spin doctors, politicians, entrepreneurs, capitalists and anti-capitalists, environmentalists, exploited and exploiters of this world.

I repeat: this book doesn't definitely smell of crude oil. No oil drums involved. No Brent Crude classification diagrams. No gas w...more It's hard to find a single drop of oil in "Kapitoil", but this doesn't mean you shouldn't read this novel.

Yes, I'm talking to you bankers, speculators, brokers, financial advisers, oligarchs, sheiks, Russian PMs and Iranian presidents, spin doctors, politicians, entrepreneurs, capitalists and anti-capitalists, environmentalists, exploited and exploiters of this world.

I repeat: this book doesn't definitely smell of crude oil. No oil drums involved. No Brent Crude classification diagrams. No gas wells around. No black petroleum stains as bookmarks.
I'm sorry Vladimir and Mahmoud.

Al? Haven't you heard me? There's nothing for you here.

And yet, Teddy Wayne's first novel is a pretty good one.
Let's take the protagonist, Karim from Qatar (please pronounce it Cutter). Wayne made him an amazing character with a distinctive personality and a wonderful vocabulary, a geek with a heart, a wizard with a soul.

Whereas contemporary authors like Mohsin Hamid or even Jonathan Safran Foer (yes!) had a similar extended use of monologue for their main characters, but ended up with a boring and unrealistic result, Wayne learned the lesson in a better way. Karim never annoys me. And I am able to understand his behavior, his peculiar logic, the way his moral probity and curiosity are both being challenged by New York City in A.D 1999.

Do you remember all that fear for something called the Millennium Bug?
That's it. Teddy Wayne did and does and he decided to backdate a novel which he could have easily tried to set up on 2010-2011 ten years earlier when NYC was unbroken: I found it an interesting choice.

The cast of American characters surrounding Karim - a Qatariman in New York as Sting would put it - is chosen very well and highlights the story in a perfect and poignant way. Less appropriated are the two characters left behind in Doha, Karim's father and sister but Mr Wayne mostly keeps them hanging at the telephone.

Surprisingly enough, I would label "Kapitoil" as a "romantic novel" if any label may be needed.
Because at the end of the day it's Karim sentimental involvement for a workmate (how obvious! You would say. Well. perhaps. But it works) the main plot here.
Yes, of course, there is a sharp criticism to the lack of morality of a certain top financial world caught before 9/11 and well before the crack of Lehman bros and all that came after. And there is also some math every now and then, but not the dry jargon you would expect in the mouth of a banker and a self-taught software engineer.

Quoting Karim, he is very much "the cream of the cream" of a novel written with a clever and well-trained hand. Not a book to worship or one of the most brilliant novels of the last years, but quite certainly a smart, compelling and entertaining reading. And - ok, Al! I will tell them - this novel doesn't pollute the environment like all hydrocarbons do. Well done, Wayne! Don't walk away from this path. (less)

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Aug 08, 2011 Shawn Sorensen rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

Kapitoil works best as a refreshingly non-sensationalistic look at American capitalism. This is a likeable book with a likeable main character, Karim, who is equal parts objective and open to the people he encounters in his brief fews months as a young financial genius working for a New York securities firm desperate for a profit boost.

Karim invents a computer program that accurately predicts oil futures and makes his company, Schrub Equities, a ton of new cash. In a sad twist, the program is b...more

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Aug 21, 2012 Madame X rated it 4 of 5 stars

In Teddy Wayne's KAPITOIL, a young emigrant of Qatar, Karim, flies to New York City to work for Schrub Equities, a prominent banking firm. Karim, a genius of mathematics, economics and computer science, has been hired to help reprogram the company's computers to deal with the Y2K transition in five months' time. At Schrub Equities he's assigned to a group of young colleagues including Rebecca Goldman, a recent college graduate who dreams of being a history teacher.

Karim finds acclimating to U.S....more In Teddy Wayne's KAPITOIL, a young emigrant of Qatar, Karim, flies to New York City to work for Schrub Equities, a prominent banking firm. Karim, a genius of mathematics, economics and computer science, has been hired to help reprogram the company's computers to deal with the Y2K transition in five months' time. At Schrub Equities he's assigned to a group of young colleagues including Rebecca Goldman, a recent college graduate who dreams of being a history teacher.

Karim finds acclimating to U.S. culture troublesome, as language barriers and unfamiliar social norms get in his way. He also has trouble keeping up contact with his father and sister Zahira, a prodigy of the science world, at home in Qatar. Bored by his job, Karim spends some free time researching oil trends, and realizes that he can create a program to predict fluctuations in oil prices based on events in the Middle East. Whoever uses the program to predict oil prices can make huge profits, as long as no one else becomes aware of its existence. He creates the program, titling it Kapitoil, and brings it to the attention of his boss, who quickly decides to give it a trial run. After fixing some initial errors, Karim is able to make Kapitoil run smoothly and make big gains for Schrub Equities. In no time at all, he's brought to the attention of the president, Mr. Schrub, who gives Karim a payraise and promotion and begins personally grooming him for a leadership position in the company.

As Karim's standing in the workplace rises, his social standing does as well. He gets a taste of the lifestyle of the wealthy, attending a World Series game with Mr. Schrub and flying out by helicopter to Greenwich, Conneticut for a weekend with the Schrubs at their luxurious home. Meanwhile, his relationship with Rebecca deepens from friendship to romance. But conflict with his father over the best course of Zahira's education (for which Karim is partially paying) weighs on his mind, and some uneasy exchanges with Mr. Schrub cause him to wonder whether his boss is trying to swindle him out of ownership of Kapitoil. When Karim realizes that he might be able to apply the program to fluctuating disease patterns in Third World countries, making it potentially invaluable to the medical community, he must make the choice between unveiling his idea to the public (thereby negating Kapitoil's advantage in the financial market) or protecting the program and his position at Schrub Equities.

Told from Karim's point of view, KAPITOIL is a fascinating look inside the head of a mathematical genius struggling to adapt to a culture a world apart from the one in which he grew up. Given the timeframe of the book (beginning five months prior to the start of the new millenium) and the ethnic background of the protagonist, KAPITOIL could have been a mouthpiece for thoughts on September 11th, but instead author Wayne chooses to tell the unrelated story of a young Middle Easterner who, significantly, doesn't like being boxed in by Americans' expectations of him. Filled with mechanical and clinical verbs that become awkward on occasion, the unique narration nonetheless manages to relate the humanity and humor of its protagonist. Karim, with his mathematical view of the world and awkward attempts at American jokes, is a quirky and lovable character. Wayne deftly weaves in themes of alienation and moral decline, complex familial and romantic relationships, and an ethical dilemma for Karim to deal with in this entertaining first novel.(less)

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Aug 02, 2011 Claire rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: reviewed

http://www.tkreviews.org/#/kapitoil/4...

You might recognize Teddy Wayne’s name as a frequent contributor to the humor section of McSweeney’s Internet Tendency (and the author of two of my favorite short pieces from the site: “Feedback from James Joyce’s Submission of Ulyssesto His Creative-Writing Workshop” and “Parallels Between My Living Through Two Years of Middle School and Two Terms of the Bush Presidency.”) According to the note in the back of his slightly-more-serious but just-as-wonderfu...more

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Mar 18, 2011 Ensiform rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

Karim Issar, a computer programmer from Qatar, joins the New York office of the conglomerate he works for, Schrub Equities, to fix the Y2K bug in their systems. Painfully aware of his uncertainties about many American idioms and cultural gaps, Karim tries to expand a social network in the city, despite Asperger’s-like tendencies to analyze everything in terms of efficiencies rather than emotions. On his own time, he develops a program called Kapitoil that very successfully tracks oil prices base...more Karim Issar, a computer programmer from Qatar, joins the New York office of the conglomerate he works for, Schrub Equities, to fix the Y2K bug in their systems. Painfully aware of his uncertainties about many American idioms and cultural gaps, Karim tries to expand a social network in the city, despite Asperger’s-like tendencies to analyze everything in terms of efficiencies rather than emotions. On his own time, he develops a program called Kapitoil that very successfully tracks oil prices based on global unrest; this shoots him to the top at Schrub and leaves him time to develop a burgeoning relationship with a fellow programmer, Rebecca.

This is a fine comic novel, full of sly wit. Karim’s fresh, often skewed yet perspicacious take on subjects ranging from clubbing to ironic humor to romantic relationships (“I was pretending not to pay attention to her, because people act according to supply-and-demand equilibrium like prices do”) to the lyrics of Leonard Cohen are amusing and poignant in equal measure. He’s quite sympathetic, so I was riveted as his potential paths beckoned, from potential “master of the universe” money-conscious urban d-bag to compassionate inventor and agent of change. That said, the book isn’t without flaws; Karim’s constant misuse of language (“vibrate” for “shake,” “enhanced” for “got better,” “delete” for “go away,” no matter what the context), gets stale and diminishes the book’s verisimilitude, as Karim is a very intelligent person and could quickly work out the subtleties of meaning based on circumstance. And although there’s nothing that rang false to me about Karim’s Qatari background, I heard more “college white boy” in his speech (as amusing as it was) than Arab. Indeed, Karim loses his Arab nature fairly quickly, falling into drinking, tolerance for gays, and sex early on without compunction, and it struck me that there’s little truly integral to the book about his being an Arab. With very minor tweaks, he could have been a genius programmer with Asperger’s from Iowa with a strict religious background and a shut-in father, and it wouldn’t have changed much. So I do question if Wayne achieved what he meant in making this a “pre-9/11” story about an Arab in New York. But overall it was a fun novel with fresh, appealing, assured prose.(less)

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Mar 12, 2011 Greg Zimmerman rated it 5 of 5 stars

You might expect a character like Karim Issar, who corrects others' grammar, who doesn't get humor, whose language is sprinkled with techno-financial business geek speak, and who lays out his decision-making processes in painstaking, ultra-logical detail, to not be the most likable fellow you've ever read. But you'd be wrong — Karim is actually a wonderfully sympathetic, interesting character. And his story is equally sympathetic, interesting, and fun.

Karim's story begins in the fall of 1999 wit...more You might expect a character like Karim Issar, who corrects others' grammar, who doesn't get humor, whose language is sprinkled with techno-financial business geek speak, and who lays out his decision-making processes in painstaking, ultra-logical detail, to not be the most likable fellow you've ever read. But you'd be wrong — Karim is actually a wonderfully sympathetic, interesting character. And his story is equally sympathetic, interesting, and fun.

Karim's story begins in the fall of 1999 with a cross-Atlantic flight, during which he makes up math problems to amuse himself. Karim is coming to American to work on the Y2K problem in the New York office of the investment company he'd worked for in Doha, Qatar. After a co-worker steals credit for a profitable program he develops, he's more cautious with his next endeavor: The Kapitoil program, which accurately predicts oil futures and makes his struggling company a crapload of cash.

Meanwhile, Karim also explores the nightlife of New York, heading out to clubs, museums and parties with his clownish co-workers. Through an often painful (but fun to read) trial-and-error process, he slowly learns American etiquette on everything from one-night stands to interoffice crushes. Soon, circumstances force Karim into a tough choice regarding Kapitoil, and his traditional Qatari values collide with the possibility to make a ton of money for himself — but at a pretty hefty moral cost.

It's a straightforward narrative, but Karim's voice and Wayne's writing are anything but. Karim's voice, as Wayne explains in the podcast above, is the result of Wayne's desire to write a novel with an idiosyncratic voice guiding the narrative as well as his want to use language to be disruptive— but in a good way, because Karim's false starts with language and violations of American etiquette make you cringe and laugh at the same time. And as Karim begins learning the ways of New York, the novel begins to move from a laugh-at-Karim, to now laughing-with-Karim dynamic. He slowly begins to "get it" and as his moral dilemma arrives, you're confident he's now equipped with the tools to make the right decision. But will he?

If you're a fan hip, urban fiction, you'll dig this. If you enjoyed the way Jonathan Safran Foer wrote his character Alex in Everything is Illuminated — stilted, just-a-bit-off-English — you'll really enjoy Karim specifically but also the novel on the whole. It's a quick read and definitely one worth checking out, especially if you're someone (like me) who enjoys "getting in on the ground floor" of talented new novelists, like Mr. Wayne. But this isn't just some obscure novel from a writer you'll never hear from again — Teddy Wayne writes frequently for the New York Times (and many other pubs) and Kapitoil was blurbed by Jonathan Franzen and given a coveted "starred review" by both Publisher's Weekly and Booklist. (less)

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Nov 22, 2010 Patrick rated it 4 of 5 stars

This was a very good book about a muslim computer wiz who is brought from Qatar to America by a financial company to get its computers ready for the switch from 1999 to 2000. Just being reminded of how that was supposed to be a huge catastrophe for all the computers of the world was an interesting background for the story. Its interesting how what can be hyped up as a potential major calamity can be almost completely forgotten 10 years later. However, the book does not delve too deeply into this...more

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Sep 05, 2010 Shawn rated it 4 of 5 stars

I've found that anything that McSweeneys adds to their McSweeneys recommends list is worth reading, and Kapitoil is no exception. The novel starts off slowly, in fact I was about to give it up as I was getting sick of the repetitive Borat/EiL jokes about immigrants having a comically poor command of the English language. Fortunately, the book picks up when it goes from making fun of people who speak in business textbook language to being a Faustian tale of American capitalism.

The book tells the...more

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Aug 11, 2010 Jim Leffert rated it 4 of 5 stars

A bright young man from Doha, Qatar, Karim Issar, comes to New York City in the period before 9/11 to do computer work for Schrub Equities, a prominent Wall Street firm. This entertaining, charming, and affecting novel presents Karim’s journal entries, in which he mangles the English language for a while (although he’s a diligent learner) and shares his discoveries as he attempts to navigate the work and social milieu and decipher the idioms of daily conversation. At the same time, Karim stays i...more

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May 03, 2010 spencer rated it 5 of 5 stars

Outstanding debut. A simple stranger in a strange land story about Karim, an Islamic computer programmer from Qatar who is brought to New York by a financial firm to work on the Y2K bug. Through the wonders of literature he writes a computer program in a couple of weeks which continuously scans the Internet to make predictions about the oil futures market (one wonders if Wayne forgets what the Internet was like in 1999, as we are never told whether Karim still uses dial-up, or wether he prefers...more

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May 30, 2011 Elaine rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011

Holding aside my discomfort with the ventroliquism at the center of the novel (I can't help feeling it's "OK" to do things with Arabs that we wouldn't do with others -- e.g., how would we feel about a NYC white prep school/Harvard grad writing a comic novel about an immigrant from Asia who talked like Charlie Chan, or a poor black kid from the South who speaks in dialect), I also didn't care for the plot. The story's arc is heavily telegraphed from the very beginning, and watching the western bu...more

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Mar 09, 2011 jess rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011, fiction

This is the story of Karim Issar, who comes to the US from Qatar in 1999 to work as a computer programmer for a financial company in NYC. Karim was hired to help with the Y2K problem (heh, remember that?), but he invents a program that uses algorithms based on current events to predict fluctuations in oil commodities -- and invest/sell accordingly to make tons of money.

This book was easy and fun to read, and I enjoyed reading it. But at the end I had this feeling like "my god, was this written...more

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Sep 15, 2012 Garry rated it 2 of 5 stars

I guess it's normal when reading a novel to build up a mental image of the characters. My mental image of Karim Issar, the central character in Kapitoil, was of this man..........................

.............................. description

Those familiar with Community will know that this is Abed. Abed sees the world differently to others. Abed communicates differently to others. Abed is Middle Eastern. Abed steals the show. Abed could very easily be our Karim Issar.

description

Those familiar with Community will know that...more

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Jul 10, 2010 Stacy rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: five-stars, read-in-2010

This was a little different than I expected, but I really liked it.

The story is told in diary/journal format and takes place in New York in 1999. Karim is a programmer from Qatar who's working on solutions to the Y2K problem.

Karim uses his programmer's logic to make decisions at his job and in his personal life. He is very curious about the people and customs around him, and makes notes of the new words that he is learning. He has a lot of trouble with slang and picking up on sarcasm. There are...more

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Feb 01, 2011 Manussawee rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, tob2011, tob

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. I really wanted to like this book more, but for some reasons I just couldn't get into the story. May be the fact that I was finishing the book while stuck on the bus during a blizzard which caused some anxieties didn't help...

The story was about a programmer, Karim Issar, who came from Doha, Qatar to work in the US on Y2K project for a big trading firm Schrub Equities. When he came up with a successful trading strategy, his superior paid attention. He became a star within the firm and got specia...more I really wanted to like this book more, but for some reasons I just couldn't get into the story. May be the fact that I was finishing the book while stuck on the bus during a blizzard which caused some anxieties didn't help...

The story was about a programmer, Karim Issar, who came from Doha, Qatar to work in the US on Y2K project for a big trading firm Schrub Equities. When he came up with a successful trading strategy, his superior paid attention. He became a star within the firm and got special treatments from Mr. Schrub himself. However, he later came to find out that the firm were only after his code. Since he patented the program under his name, Schrub wanted him to sign a contract giving the firm ownership of the code. It promised large amount of money to him. In the end, Karim was forced to make a hard choice.

I liked Karim. He tried so hard to adjust to the culture and the language as best as he could. He was intelligent and logical, but he didn't know how to relate well with others emotionally. He would reason out every thoughts and actions. I was first finding it hard to understand the way he talked, but I got used to it and found it to be clever and enjoyable. It had a formal undertone, which made his conversations funny without being funny. I had to laugh because no one really talk like him, at least not Americans I know. But I could see many foreigners like him thinking and talking similarly to him. He slowly "Americanized" his actions and values. I think first was because he wanted to fit in, and second I think it was because the loneliness he felt. So he compromised many of his values. He got drunk and lost his virginity to a random girl he met at a party. He certainly didn't attend prayers at the mosque nearly as often as he should, especially observed Ramadan. Even though he felt bad, he usually found justifications for his actions. I thought his relationship with Rebecca was sweet, but the fact that it didn't get a happy ending was a little disappointing to me. I guess a happy ending wasn't the point here. The fact that Karim didn't compromise his value in the end and, I think therefore, didn't become completely "Americanized" was the point here. I also found what Karim said to Mr. Schrub at the end (his negotiation) to be satisfactory... that Karim stood up for himself and didn't get walked all over by the money and other perks that Mr. Schrub was flaunting at him.

Despite the above, I thought the story lacked some "oomphs." I wish I could connect more with the characters, but I just wasn't drawn to them.(less)

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Aug 19, 2010 Nick rated it 4 of 5 stars

(some spoilers)

This book was recommended to me by a friend (thanks abby!) who is friends with the author. She described it as 'the pre-9/11 novel, capturing the angst and anxiety of Y2K global computer failings and the financial bubble burst'. And I don't disagree with her there, but the way I'd describe it... 'come for a y2k snapshot, stay for the human to human connection of two disparate people from two disparate backgrounds'. Yea, won't see that as a tagline...anywhere.

Wayne's had his share...more (some spoilers)

This book was recommended to me by a friend (thanks abby!) who is friends with the author. She described it as 'the pre-9/11 novel, capturing the angst and anxiety of Y2K global computer failings and the financial bubble burst'. And I don't disagree with her there, but the way I'd describe it... 'come for a y2k snapshot, stay for the human to human connection of two disparate people from two disparate backgrounds'. Yea, won't see that as a tagline...anywhere.

Wayne's had his share of praise for development of the protagonist Karim Issar, a talented Qatr-born computer programmer/financial stock predictor/employee of a giant global investor/other professional job titles that I don't fully grasp. Basically, he writes computer programs using complex algorithms to predict oil futures and stock market data.

Wayne has said he did not want to write a 9/11 novel and while I can appreciate that, there are some aspects of this novel that would have benefitted from further development. For example, Karim's uncomfortable assimilation from a life in Qatr to a New York stock trader's jet set lifestyle is illustrated with conversations with his father, still in Qatr, a traditionalist Muslim. They speak of bombings and U.S. interference of the region. I think if this was explored a little further, it would have better 'shown' a growing sense of distrust of the American people. These conversations and this aspect of the story seemed almost an afterthought, not wanting to delve too deeply into a controversial subject, not really knowing how to treat it. And I see where Wayne may have wanted to hold back there, but I found myself wanting more.

Karim made a really interesting protagonist, his plight and so forth. But while Wayne went to great lengths to hilight the 'Karim-esque', sometimes Karim's perfect speech and grammar and grasp on complex mathematics made the Karim-esque seemed robotic-esque. His diction especially. But again, there's a challenge there to give a character who studies perfect English to better assimilate finding himself in a sea of business jargon and slang.

The best aspect for me is the story of Rebecca, a New York typical 20 something experiencing ennui and self-doubt. Takes Zoloft, has a bad relationship with her father. I don't want to say 'first world problems' but very much different from Karim. Their romantic connection develops quite naturally and Wayne does well to bring them together in a sort of clumsy way you'd expect of two people with their respective backgrounds. This was my favorite part; how two people with nothing in common clumsily found their way into each others arms. (less)

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Mar 13, 2011 Jamie Bradway rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: nook, tob-2011

I noticed for the first time today, when mousing over the rating stars that text pops up for each one: It was amazing, I really liked it, I liked it, It was okay, I didn't like it. Nevermind that we probably all understand the system without the text, I was thinking ahead as I was selecting my rating, "What can I say about this book other than 'I liked it'?"

I liked it.

Or, to expound, I liked the character. The cultural differences and complications may be a bit unusual (or unlikely) but Karim's...more

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May 16, 2010 Beth rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: first-reads

I won this book in a Goodreads First Reads drawing. Good story with a very likable main character, Karim. This is a story about a computer programmer from Qatar who comes to America, writes a program that capitalizes on unrest in the world to predict swings in the price of oil. He makes a lot of money for his company and gets a promotion. But he soon starts to question the morality of his program. You go along for the ride as Karim becomes Americanized. The book is written in diary format, and a...more

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Mar 08, 2011 Kristine rated it 3 of 5 stars

Recommended to Kristine by: 2011 Tournament of Books

This novel is a set of idiosyncratic journal entries by a young male computer programmer from Qatar working on the Y2K problem for a financial firm in the World Trade Center in 1999. There is plenty of meaning built into this fresh and humorous story as we follow Karim Issar through his mind, coping with the language barrier (all those tricky idioms!) and culture clash as he tries to become an American success without losing his humanity. It's sweet and funny with an unusual perspective. (view s ...more

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Jul 18, 2012 Rob rated it 4 of 5 stars

An enjoyable debut that scouts out the causes célèbres of our days via the narration of a young financial whizz kid from Doha. Despite the combustible subject matter, there is much restraint - we know that 9/11 is round the corner but the action stops before this and any foreshadowing is kept to a minimum.

The grotesque nature of the financial sector in New York, complete with its $400 bottles of champagne, sub-Jackass humour and naked greed is rightly exposed - although never to the extent tha...more

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Mar 18, 2011 Stephanie rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011-tob

One of the best books I've read this year. I tore through it, and it made some long commutes go very quickly. The main character is the main reason to read this book. He has a unique voice and a new--almost shiny and new--outlook on Manhattan, where he has come to work and live.
The book hit a chord for me on a personal level. It takes place in NYC at the end of 1999, when I happened to be living in Brooklyn and working in Manhattan. I recognized the "observer" viewpoint that Karim takes on from...more

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Jan 29, 2013 Joe Krudys rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: commercial-fiction

I read this book because of the 2010 recommendation from Jonathan Franzen in the Daily Beast, which I actually just stumbled across recently.

I really enjoyed this book for its story, but even more so because of the characters that I felt Teddy Wayne developed so well. Karim was extremely likable and I felt really invested in his navigation of a foreign territory, being America in general, and more closely its corporate practices in the financial industry. I also enjoyed watching Rebecca navigate...more

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Dec 29, 2010 Jennifer rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: adult-fiction

Karim Issar, a brilliant computer programmer, is sent from his investment bank's branch office in Qatar to New York City for three months at the close of 1999 to help prevent a Y2K meltdown of the company's computer system. Just for the fun of it, he devises a program he names Kapitoil, which accurately predicts oil futures. Karim recounts his ensuing adventures in the hands of the bank's money sharks in the form of a journal he keeps. Since he learned much of his English by reading business boo...more

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Feb 23, 2011 Patty rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, 2011, family, fathers-and-sons, qatar, muslim, new-york-city, immigrant-experience, wall-street, contemporary-fiction, friendship, mathematicians, computer-programs, arabs, tournament-of-books

I would not have ever read this book without the Morning News' Tournament of Books and it would have been a shame to miss it. Karim Issar comes to the United States to work for an investment company. It starts working on the Y2K problem - when did you last think about that problem?

It turns out that Karim is very good with numbers and is still learning about relationships. Many of the comic turns in this book use his inexperience, but not in a painful way. I am often discomforted by humor that ma...more

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Sep 13, 2012 Kimberly French rated it 4 of 5 stars

I found this a very satisfying read: story of Karim Issar, a young Muslim man from Qatar, a smart & hard-working programmer who comes to NY in hopes of rising in the financial industry...his dedication to mastering English, which is completely charming...his discoveries about how the banking industry works, how money is made...the tension between his desire to do something good in the world & to be recongnized as a success in his field; also between duty to family and making his own way...more

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Aug 23, 2010 Mari Anne rated it 4 of 5 stars

I really enjoyed this odd little book that the author bills as a "pre 9/11" novel. This book reminded me a lot of "A curious incident of a dog in the nighttime" mainly because the main character, Karim, while not autistic, has a definitely odd way of processing input and relating to others. Like someone with Asbergers, this immigrant from Qatar feels more at home in the world of math and computer code than he does in the world of humans. His idiosyncratic take on relationships, work, his ultra-r...more

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Jul 29, 2011 rachelbianca added it

A nice read. I heard of this book when I read a list of titles recommended by Jonathan Franzen. He said that the author is skilled at creating a voice completely different from their own, and I agree. The author takes on the voice of an computer programer from Qatar who comes to America in the pre-9/11 days to work and what begins as a contract project. The narrator is likable, somewhat naive, but highly intelligent. He uses his brains, rather then shallow networking skills, to become a Wall Str...more

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Mar 10, 2013 Melissa Acuna rated it 5 of 5 stars

A completely enchanting, unique story. Karim is a brilliant, genuine character, the kind of person you'd want to hang out with. The story is told first person by Karim, and the author uses the hook of idiomatic English language. Karim knows finance and computer programming and he's aware that to succeed in American finance he has to master not only the formal language, but the customs and the trends.

Set in 1999, with the Y2K cliff approaching, Karim travels from Qatar to Manhattan to help ensur...more

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Aug 04, 2010 Kyle rated it 4 of 5 stars

I picked this up because a blogger whose taste in books I respect recommended it. Karim may not be my new favorite character in recent reading, but I'm glad to have read his struggle.

Karim's voice is unique and interesting, as an outsider to America and life, but an insider on programming and business. He knows his strengths and weaknesses to a fault, and we follow his story during a period of a few months at the end of 1999, when he is revolutionizing the oil futures market by writing a program...more I picked this up because a blogger whose taste in books I respect recommended it. Karim may not be my new favorite character in recent reading, but I'm glad to have read his struggle.

Karim's voice is unique and interesting, as an outsider to America and life, but an insider on programming and business. He knows his strengths and weaknesses to a fault, and we follow his story during a period of a few months at the end of 1999, when he is revolutionizing the oil futures market by writing a program that predicts prices based on bad news. He is intelligent and moreover torn between his past and a more compromised future.

Wayne nails this character really well (which probably stems from his time spent editing foreign resumes), and there's a part of me that really loves decoding his sentences to find the meaning hidden in what shared meaning Karim gives our language. Some of the funnier parts of the book came from mixed definitions and connotations, and the phrases that Karim needs to have explained. Thankfully, Karim has done his studying before moving to America, so we're not left with "Perfect Strangers," but it leaves me perplexed about some of the words and phrases that he just does not know or seem to get the hang of. I get why he doesn't get rid of some of his language because no one would bother to correct him or give him strange looks. Keeping "stimulated" for "excited," however, just grated on me as one word that someone would probably fix pretty quickly, given usage and connotation. I can't imagine that Karim isn't assiduous enough to figure some of these things out, even if it adds to the humor overall. I feel like this is something that an editor should've refined.

In fact, my biggest problems with the book are more about how it was edited and produced, moreso than the actual content and writing. I know this is his first novel, but the back cover reads like some of the resumes Wayne must've edited, with references to his schooling rather than, say, who he is as a person. Shouldn't I want to read his book because the concept and ideas hook me in and not because of who trained him? I think that was supposed to be fixed through the extended author interview and "favorite books" list in the appendix, but really? If I want to find out more about an author, I'm fully capable of searching the Internet. The "Troubleshooting Guide" in the back is tacked on and not even a joke representative of the rest of the book. Wayne is clearly a funny, intelligent guy from the writing between these griefs, and I have no idea why his editors allowed his novel to come off looking and sounding as though it belongs on the YA lit shelf.

Also in desperate need to be eliminated are the many, many pop culture references. More than once, Karim comes in contact with media, as we are so frequently inundated with in America, but rather than just encountering them, I feel like Wayne piggybacks on some concepts and even does some post-modern metacriticism through Karim on some of the Steinbeck referenced. The music referenced gets some similar treatment, though not in the same vein. Karim does grow and change because of these encounters, but if the character isn't really strong enough to stand on its own without reminding us of other, more memorable characters, there's a problem there. Nothing should make me remember The Grapes of Wrath and put your book down to read that again. I feel like an editor should have at least noted that in the margins.

All that said, Wayne is quick-witted and knows how to turn a phrase. He has a ridiculous amount of control of a sentence, and I'm hoping to see that evolve into a more refined work in his next novel. I'm glad Karim was such an interesting compromising character, someone who did end up growing and changing, becoming more human as he both rejected and embraced his past. Some phrases from the last few entries will stick with me for a while, and his voice definitely will.

Wayne kept his story light while discussing some moderately heavy ideas, an interesting route that kept the whole thing from feeling too melodramatic, and, well, first-novel-ish. I'll be glad to see where he goes from here, and hopefully we won't need a resume to convince us to read his next book.(less)

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Apr 27, 2010 Richard rated it 2 of 5 stars

What a strange story. A young man's first experience outside Qatar (yes, they do pronounce it Cut ter) includes airplane travel to New York City; ignoring his Muslim teachings to eat unclean food; drink alcoholic beverages; have a one night stand with a stranger; start a relationship with a Jewish woman, sleeping with her many times; and trying to outsmart his billionaire boss.

It is not as funny as you might expect this fish-out-of-water tale would be, but I guess from the author interview in th...more

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