The writing style Smith employs in NW is less traditional and more adventurous (modern?) than that of White Teeth or On Beauty, though the thematic territory is similar. The book is divided into sections: "Visitation" is about Leah Hanwell, "Guest," about Felix Cooper, and "Host" about Natalie (formerly Keisha) Blake. Two final, shorter sections, "Crossing" and "Visitation" (again) are also about Natalie.

In many ways, Felix is the character who was easiest to understand and connect to; his section is told in a straightforward manner, and though he has a shady history, he has a promising future (cut short, alas). This section, however "connects weakly" with the rest of the book (Mars-Jones).

Of Natalie's section, Salon's Laura Miller observes, "[It] comes broken into numbered bits, reflecting Natalie/Keisha’s conviction that she has assembled an identity out of disconnected fragments, held together by the sheer force of that unstoppable mutated will." The short, numbered "bits" are actually an effective way to deliver the story; part of "Host" appeared in The New Yorker, which whetted my appetite for reading NW. I didn't wholly connect with Keisha/Natalie Blake, but I didn't feel the storytelling style was at fault.

I find Smith's fiction easier to connect to on an intellectual level than on an emotional one; I admire her novels and her awesome, fearsome intelligence and talent, but I don't usually *love* them, and NW continues this pattern. Though professional reviews (see links below) vary from praise to criticism, each makes good observations.

Overall, I can't completely disagree with Kakutani's characterization of the novel as "jerry-built and weirdly contrived" or Mars-Jones' description of it as "oddly divided between confidence and indecision....Uncertainty keeps on cracking the pavements and makes for a stumbling journey through the streets of the book."

In terms of theme, though, Miller poses the questions, "If you want to be the sole author of the dictionary that defines you, what do you do with your past? Is it even possible to erase it and start over? What good is an identity that has no roots, no depth, no history?" And each character - Leah, Felix, and Natalie - lives out a different answer. Leah does not move far from her roots in any sense, nor does she feel like a true adult, though to an outsider she would appear to be doing all right. Felix had trouble with drugs, but is clean and sober and has the most forward momentum and optimism of the three; he knows what he's about. Keisha/Natalie, who would appear the most successful of the three - good degree, good job, money, house, husband, kids - is the least substantial. From childhood on, she has never truly known who she is; she simply works hard to fulfill expectations of herself, other people's ideas about who she is. As a reader, it is difficult to feel deeply for characters who are confused about who they are, but it's worth trying.

Reviews:

NYT Review (Michiko Kakutani)

Salon Review (Laura Miller)

The Guardian (UK) Review (Adam Mars-Jones)

Quotes:

Now she sees ten-year-olds and cannot believe they have inside them what she had inside her at the same age. (Leah, 50)

"Of course, it's an island we're on here. I always forget that, don't you?" (Leah's mom Pauline, 53)

"How can you stop people going when they want to go? How can you stop them? You can't stop them." (Felix's dad Lloyd, 119)

Five and innocent at this bus stop. Fourteen and drunk. Twenty-six and stoned. Twenty-nine in utter oblivion....You live in the same place long enough, you get memory overlap. (Felix, 135)

Some days have a depressing thematic coherence. (Tom, who is selling a car to Felix, 152)

She was gone again without saying goodbye. Like a ghost on your shoulder and then vanished, the everyday miracle. (Felix, after a phone call with Grace, 157)

She could talk anyone away from her door. She could fall and fall and fall and still never quite hit the ground. (Annie, 167)

They fit together. They always had. But what was the point of fitting in this way and no other? (Felix and Annie, 182)

"There was an inevitability about their road toward each other which encouraged meandering along the route." (Natalie and Frank, 247)

...she would check...whether or not that was the correct wording. Then again, perhaps the way she had remembered it was the thing that was important. (Natalie, 302)

At some point we become aware of being "modern," of changing fast. Of coming just after now. John Donne was modern and also surely saw change but we feel we are more modern and that the change is faster. Even the immutable is faster. (Natalie, 305)

Women come bearing time. (Natalie, 316)

...her imagination - due to a long process of neglect, almost as long as her life - did not have the generative power to muster an alternative future for itself. (Natalie, 364)

There is a connection between boredom and the desire for chaos. Despite many disguises and bluffs perhaps she had never stopped wanting chaos. (Natalie, 365)

Strange family.
Only kind there is.
(Natalie and Nathan, 382)

"I don't know what I'm going to want until when I want it." (Natalie's daughter Naomi, 392)