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Content snapshot
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Violence
Barely any
Minimal violence
Language
Some
Some strong language in the academic literary fiction register
Sexual Content
Some
Adult infidelity and some sexual content handled with literary restraint
Substance Use
Barely any
Social drinking in the academic milieu
Emotional Intensity
Some
The psychological dynamics of academic ego, racial identity, and marital failure are the novel's rich terrain
What this book is about
Zadie Smith's Booker Prize-shortlisted novel follows two families — the mixed-race Belsey family in a Massachusetts university town and the Kippses, a Trinidadian family with conservative views — whose lives become entangled when their academic patriarch husbands clash. Smith's examination of race, class, liberal hypocrisy, and marriage is sharp and funny, and the novel is a loose adaptation of E.M. Forster's Howards End. Adult content is present at the literary fiction level.
Notes for sensitive readers
Reader-flagged moments and themes that may affect your experience.
Marital infidelity as central plot element
Race and class politics throughout
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