Joseph O’Neill – författare

In early 2006, Chuck Ramkissoon is found dead at the bottom of a New York canal.In London, a Dutch banker named Hans van den Broek hears the news, and remembers his unlikely friendship with Chuck and the off-kilter New York in which it flourished: the New York of 9/11, the powercut and the Iraq war. Those years were difficult for Hans – his English wife Rachel left with their son after the attack, as if that event revealed the cracks and silences in their marriage, and he spent two strange years in New York’s Chelsea Hotel, passing stranger evenings with the eccentric residents.Lost in a country he'd regarded as his new home, Hans sought comfort in a most alien place – the thriving but almost invisible world of New York cricket, in which immigrants from Asia and the West Indies play a beautiful, mystifying game on the city's most marginal parks. It was during these games that Hans befriends Chuck Ramkissoon, who dreamed of establishing the city's first proper cricket field. Over the course of a summer, Hans grew to share Chuck's dream and Chuck's sense of American possibility – until he began to glimpse the darker meaning of his new friend's activities and ambitions.‘Netherland’ is a novel of belonging and not belonging, and the uneasy state in between. It is a novel of a marriage foundering and recuperating, and of the shallows and depths of male friendship. With it, Joseph O'Neill has taken the anxieties and uncertainties of our new century and fashioned a work of extraordinary beauty and brilliance.

‘A fantastic novel, brilliantly crafted’ MARCUS DU SAUTOY 'Enthralling … not to be missed'GUARDIAN ‘A meticulously constructed marvel' WASHINGTON POST'I wish there were more books like this' ELIF BATUMAN The return of Joseph O’Neill, with a story on the scale of the international phenomenon Netherland: the odyssey of two brothers crossing the world in search of an African football prodigy who might change their fortunes. Mark Wolfe, a brilliant if self-thwarting technical writer, lives in Pittsburgh with his wife, Sushila, and their toddler daughter. His half-brother Geoff, born and raised in the UK, is a desperate young football agent. He pulls Mark across the ocean into a scheme to track down an elusive prospect known only as “Godwin” – an African teenager Geoff believes could be the next Messi.Narrated in turn by Mark and his work colleague Lakesha Williams, the novel is both a tale of family and migration, and an international adventure story that implicates the brothers in the beauty and ugliness of football, the perils and promises of international business, and the dark history of transatlantic money-making.As only he can do, Joseph O'Neill investigates the legacy of colonialism in the context of family love, global capitalism, and the dreaming individual.'Among the best novels I’ve read in a long time' BILL BUFORD ‘Delightful, funny … rapidly told in masterful prose'FINANCIAL TIMES 'Moving … enjoyable' THE TIMES 'This has all the velocity and swerve of an unstoppable free kick'PUBLISHERS WEEKLY Joseph O’Neill's novel Netherland was longlisted for the 2008 Booker Prize

LONGLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2014SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOLINGER EVERYMAN WODEHOUSE PRIZE FOR COMIC FICTIONThe first novel from Joseph O’Neill since NETHERLAND.‘O’Neill, in this book, has come of age as a novelist … a comic masterpiece … as mordantly funny as the best of stand-up comedy … Superb’ John Banville, New York Review of BooksIn 2007, a New York attorney bumps into an old college buddy – and accepts his friend’s offer of a job in Dubai, as the overseer of an enormous family fortune. Haunted by the collapse of his relationship and hoping for a fresh start, our strange hero begins to suspect that he has exchanged one inferno for another.A funny and wholly original work of international literature, ‘The Dog’ is led by a brilliantly entertaining anti-hero. Imprisoned by his endless powers of reasoning, hemmed in by the ethical demands of globalized life, he is fatefully drawn towards the only logical response to our confounding epoch.

The debut novel from Joseph O'Neill, author of the Man Booker Prize longlisted and Richard & Judy pick, ‘Netherland’.James Jones is slipping steadily through life. He has a steady job as a junior partner at a solicitor's firm, a steady girlfriend and a steady mortgage. Nothing much is happening in Jones's life but he really doesn't mind – this is exactly the way he likes it.Michael Donovan, meanwhile, is a star – a world-class international lawyer and advocate – he's everything Jones wanted to be and isn't. Jones was once Donovan's pupil and, for a while, it looked like he too would make his name – but he left that high-powered world behind a long time ago, or so he thought.One day Jones reads in the paper that Donovan has collapsed in court – then, out of the blue, Donovan contacts him; he has a job he needs Jones to work on…Joseph O'Neill's debut is wonderfully clever and comic novel – about ambitions and aspirations and the realities that they inevitably collide with.

A fascinating family memoir from Joseph O'Neill, author of the Man Booker Prize longlisted and Richard & Judy pick, ‘Netherland’.Joseph O'Neill's grandfathers – one Irish, one Turkish – were both imprisoned during the Second World War. The Irish grandfather, a handsome rogue from a family of small farmers, was an active member of the IRA and was interned with hundreds of his comrades. O'Neill's other grandfather, a hotelier from a tiny and threatened Turkish Christian minority, was imprisoned by the British in Palestine, on suspicion of being a spy.At the age of thirty, Joseph O'Neill set out to uncover his grandfather's stories, what emerges is a narrative of two families and two charismatic but flawed men – it is a story of murder, espionage, paranoia and fear, of memories of violence and of fierce commitments to political causes.

A fascinating family memoir from Joseph O'Neill, author of the Man Booker Prize longlisted and Richard & Judy pick, ‘Netherland’.Joseph O'Neill's grandfathers – one Irish, one Turkish – were both imprisoned during the Second World War. The Irish grandfather, a handsome rogue from a family of small farmers, was an active member of the IRA and was interned with hundreds of his comrades. O'Neill's other grandfather, a hotelier from a tiny and threatened Turkish Christian minority, was imprisoned by the British in Palestine, on suspicion of being a spy.At the age of thirty, Joseph O'Neill set out to uncover his grandfather's stories, what emerges is a narrative of two families and two charismatic but flawed men – it is a story of murder, espionage, paranoia and fear, of memories of violence and of fierce commitments to political causes.

In early 2006, Chuck Ramkissoon is found dead at the bottom of a New York canal.In London, a Dutch banker named Hans van den Broek hears the news, and remembers his unlikely friendship with Chuck and the off-kilter New York in which it flourished: the New York of 9/11, the powercut and the Iraq war. Those years were difficult for Hans – his English wife Rachel left with their son after the attack, as if that event revealed the cracks and silences in their marriage, and he spent two strange years in New York’s Chelsea Hotel, passing stranger evenings with the eccentric residents.Lost in a country he'd regarded as his new home, Hans sought comfort in a most alien place – the thriving but almost invisible world of New York cricket, in which immigrants from Asia and the West Indies play a beautiful, mystifying game on the city's most marginal parks. It was during these games that Hans befriends Chuck Ramkissoon, who dreamed of establishing the city's first proper cricket field. Over the course of a summer, Hans grew to share Chuck's dream and Chuck's sense of American possibility – until he began to glimpse the darker meaning of his new friend's activities and ambitions.`Netherland’ is a novel of belonging and not belonging, and the uneasy state in between. It is a novel of a marriage foundering and recuperating, and of the shallows and depths of male friendship. With it, Joseph O'Neill has taken the anxieties and uncertainties of our new century and fashioned a work of extraordinary beauty and brilliance.

A brilliant and darkly comic novel from the Man Booker Prize longlisted author of `Netherland’.Fourteen years ago Mary Breeze was killed by lightning – it should have been all the bad luck that the Breeze family were due but, as John Breeze is about to find out, this couldn't be further from the truth. `The Breezes’ is John Breeze's account of his family's most hellish fortnight – when insurance policies, security systems and lucky underpants are pitted against redundancy, burglary and relegation – and lose. John (a failing chair-maker) and his father (railway manager and rubbish football referee) are only feebly equipped with shaky religious notions, management maxims and cynical postures as they try to come to terms with the absurd unfairness of lightning striking twice…From the conflict between blind optimism and cynicism, to the urge to pretend that things just aren't happening, `The Breezes’ is wonderfully clever and comic novel about desperately trying to cope with the worst of bad luck.

The debut novel from Joseph O'Neill, author of the Man Booker Prize longlisted and Richard & Judy pick, `Netherland’.James Jones is slipping steadily through life. He has a steady job as a junior partner at a solicitor's firm, a steady girlfriend and a steady mortgage. Nothing much is happening in Jones's life but he really doesn't mind – this is exactly the way he likes it.Michael Donovan, meanwhile, is a star – a world-class international lawyer and advocate – he's everything Jones wanted to be and isn't. Jones was once Donovan's pupil and, for a while, it looked like he too would make his name – but he left that high-powered world behind a long time ago, or so he thought.One day Jones reads in the paper that Donovan has collapsed in court – then, out of the blue, Donovan contacts him; he has a job he needs Jones to work on…Joseph O'Neill's debut is wonderfully clever and comic novel – about ambitions and aspirations and the realities that they inevitably collide with.

LONGLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2014SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOLINGER EVERYMAN WODEHOUSE PRIZE FOR COMIC FICTIONThe first novel from Joseph O’Neill since NETHERLAND.`O’Neill, in this book, has come of age as a novelist … a comic masterpiece … as mordantly funny as the best of stand-up comedy … Superb’ John Banville, New York Review of BooksIn 2007, a New York attorney bumps into an old college buddy – and accepts his friend’s offer of a job in Dubai, as the overseer of an enormous family fortune. Haunted by the collapse of his relationship and hoping for a fresh start, our strange hero begins to suspect that he has exchanged one inferno for another.A funny and wholly original work of international literature, `The Dog’ is led by a brilliantly entertaining anti-hero. Imprisoned by his endless powers of reasoning, hemmed in by the ethical demands of globalized life, he is fatefully drawn towards the only logical response to our confounding epoch.

LONGLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2014SHORTLISTED FOR THE BOLINGER EVERYMAN WODEHOUSE PRIZE FOR COMIC FICTIONThe first novel from Joseph O’Neill since NETHERLAND.‘O’Neill, in this book, has come of age as a novelist … a comic masterpiece … as mordantly funny as the best of stand-up comedy … Superb’ John Banville, New York Review of BooksIn 2007, a New York attorney bumps into an old college buddy – and accepts his friend’s offer of a job in Dubai, as the overseer of an enormous family fortune. Haunted by the collapse of his relationship and hoping for a fresh start, our strange hero begins to suspect that he has exchanged one inferno for another.A funny and wholly original work of international literature, ‘The Dog’ is led by a brilliantly entertaining anti-hero. Imprisoned by his endless powers of reasoning, hemmed in by the ethical demands of globalized life, he is fatefully drawn towards the only logical response to our confounding epoch.

Back at dinner, somebody said that the goose thinks it’s a dog. No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t think it’s a dog. The goose doesn’t think. The goose just is. And what the goose is is goose. But goose is not goose, Robert thinks. Even the goose isn’t goose. In Good Trouble, the first story collection from Joseph O’Neill, author of Netherland, characters are forced to discover exactly who they are, and who they can never quite be.There’s Rob, who swears he is a dependable member of society, but can’t scrape together a character reference to prove that’s the case. And Jayne, who has no choice but to investigate a strange noise downstairs while her husband lies glued to the bed with fear. A mother tries to find where she fits into her son’s new life of semi-soft rind-washed cheeses, and a poet tries to fathom what makes a poet. Do you even have to write poetry?Packed with O’Neill’s trademark acerbic humour, Good Trouble explores the maddening and secretly political space between thoughts and deeds, between men and women, between goose and not-goose.

Back at dinner, somebody said that the goose thinks it’s a dog. No, it doesn’t. It doesn’t think it’s a dog. The goose doesn’t think. The goose just is. And what the goose is is goose. But goose is not goose, Robert thinks. Even the goose isn’t goose.In Good Trouble, the first story collection from Joseph O’Neill, author of Netherland, characters are forced to discover exactly who they are, and who they can never quite be.There’s Rob, who swears he is a dependable member of society, but can’t scrape together a character reference to prove that’s the case. And Jayne, who has no choice but to investigate a strange noise downstairs while her husband lies glued to the bed with fear. A mother tries to find where she fits into her son’s new life of semi-soft rind-washed cheeses, and a poet tries to fathom what makes a poet. Do you even have to write poetry?Packed with O’Neill’s trademark acerbic humour, Good Trouble explores the maddening and secretly political space between thoughts and deeds, between men and women, between goose and not-goose.

‘A fantastic novel, brilliantly crafted’ MARCUS DU SAUTOY 'Enthralling … not to be missed'GUARDIAN ‘A meticulously constructed marvel' WASHINGTON POST'I wish there were more books like this' ELIF BATUMAN The return of Joseph O’Neill, with a story on the scale of the international phenomenon Netherland: the odyssey of two brothers crossing the world in search of an African football prodigy who might change their fortunes. Mark Wolfe, a brilliant if self-thwarting technical writer, lives in Pittsburgh with his wife, Sushila, and their toddler daughter. His half-brother Geoff, born and raised in the UK, is a desperate young football agent. He pulls Mark across the ocean into a scheme to track down an elusive prospect known only as “Godwin” – an African teenager Geoff believes could be the next Messi.Narrated in turn by Mark and his work colleague Lakesha Williams, the novel is both a tale of family and migration, and an international adventure story that implicates the brothers in the beauty and ugliness of football, the perils and promises of international business, and the dark history of transatlantic money-making.As only he can do, Joseph O'Neill investigates the legacy of colonialism in the context of family love, global capitalism, and the dreaming individual.'Among the best novels I’ve read in a long time' BILL BUFORD ‘Delightful, funny … rapidly told in masterful prose'FINANCIAL TIMES 'Moving … enjoyable' THE TIMES 'This has all the velocity and swerve of an unstoppable free kick'PUBLISHERS WEEKLY Joseph O’Neill's novel Netherland was longlisted for the 2008 Booker Prize

‘A fantastic novel, brilliantly crafted’ MARCUS DU SAUTOY 'Enthralling … not to be missed'GUARDIAN ‘A meticulously constructed marvel' WASHINGTON POST'I wish there were more books like this' ELIF BATUMAN The return of Joseph O’Neill, with a story on the scale of the international phenomenon Netherland: the odyssey of two brothers crossing the world in search of an African football prodigy who might change their fortunes. Mark Wolfe, a brilliant if self-thwarting technical writer, lives in Pittsburgh with his wife, Sushila, and their toddler daughter. His half-brother Geoff, born and raised in the UK, is a desperate young football agent. He pulls Mark across the ocean into a scheme to track down an elusive prospect known only as “Godwin” – an African teenager Geoff believes could be the next Messi.Narrated in turn by Mark and his work colleague Lakesha Williams, the novel is both a tale of family and migration, and an international adventure story that implicates the brothers in the beauty and ugliness of football, the perils and promises of international business, and the dark history of transatlantic money-making.As only he can do, Joseph O'Neill investigates the legacy of colonialism in the context of family love, global capitalism, and the dreaming individual.'Among the best novels I’ve read in a long time' BILL BUFORD ‘Delightful, funny … rapidly told in masterful prose'FINANCIAL TIMES 'Moving … enjoyable' THE TIMES 'This has all the velocity and swerve of an unstoppable free kick'PUBLISHERS WEEKLY Joseph O’Neill's novel Netherland was longlisted for the 2008 Booker Prize

‘A fantastic novel, brilliantly crafted’ MARCUS DU SAUTOY 'Enthralling … not to be missed'GUARDIAN ‘A meticulously constructed marvel' WASHINGTON POST'I wish there were more books like this' ELIF BATUMAN The return of Joseph O’Neill, with a story on the scale of the international phenomenon Netherland: the odyssey of two brothers crossing the world in search of an African football prodigy who might change their fortunes. Mark Wolfe, a brilliant if self-thwarting technical writer, lives in Pittsburgh with his wife, Sushila, and their toddler daughter. His half-brother Geoff, born and raised in the UK, is a desperate young football agent. He pulls Mark across the ocean into a scheme to track down an elusive prospect known only as “Godwin” – an African teenager Geoff believes could be the next Messi.Narrated in turn by Mark and his work colleague Lakesha Williams, the novel is both a tale of family and migration, and an international adventure story that implicates the brothers in the beauty and ugliness of football, the perils and promises of international business, and the dark history of transatlantic money-making.As only he can do, Joseph O'Neill investigates the legacy of colonialism in the context of family love, global capitalism, and the dreaming individual.'Among the best novels I’ve read in a long time' BILL BUFORD ‘Delightful, funny … rapidly told in masterful prose'FINANCIAL TIMES 'Moving … enjoyable' THE TIMES 'This has all the velocity and swerve of an unstoppable free kick'PUBLISHERS WEEKLY Joseph O’Neill's novel Netherland was longlisted for the 2008 Booker Prize

‘A fantastic novel, brilliantly crafted’ MARCUS DU SAUTOY''Enthralling … not to be missed''GUARDIAN‘A meticulously constructed marvel'' WASHINGTON POST''I wish there were more books like this'' ELIF BATUMANThe return of Joseph O’Neill, with a story on the scale of the international phenomenon Netherland: the odyssey of two brothers crossing the world in search of an African football prodigy who might change their fortunes.Mark Wolfe, a brilliant if self-thwarting technical writer, lives in Pittsburgh with his wife, Sushila, and their toddler daughter. His half-brother Geoff, born and raised in the UK, is a desperate young football agent. He pulls Mark across the ocean into a scheme to track down an elusive prospect known only as “Godwin” – an African teenager Geoff believes could be the next Messi.Narrated in turn by Mark and his work colleague Lakesha Williams, the novel is both a tale of family and migration, and an international adventure story that implicates the brothers in the beauty and ugliness of football, the perils and promises of international business, and the dark history of transatlantic money-making.As only he can do, Joseph O''Neill investigates the legacy of colonialism in the context of family love, global capitalism, and the dreaming individual.''Among the best novels I’ve read in a long time'' BILL BUFORD‘Delightful, funny … rapidly told in masterful prose''FINANCIAL TIMES''Moving … enjoyable'' THE TIMES''This has all the velocity and swerve of an unstoppable free kick''PUBLISHERS WEEKLYJoseph O’Neill''s novel Netherland was longlisted for the 2008 Booker Prize

‘A fantastic novel, brilliantly crafted’ MARCUS DU SAUTOY''Enthralling … not to be missed''GUARDIAN‘A meticulously constructed marvel'' WASHINGTON POST''I wish there were more books like this'' ELIF BATUMANThe return of Joseph O’Neill, with a story on the scale of the international phenomenon Netherland: the odyssey of two brothers crossing the world in search of an African football prodigy who might change their fortunes.Mark Wolfe, a brilliant if self-thwarting technical writer, lives in Pittsburgh with his wife, Sushila, and their toddler daughter. His half-brother Geoff, born and raised in the UK, is a desperate young football agent. He pulls Mark across the ocean into a scheme to track down an elusive prospect known only as “Godwin” – an African teenager Geoff believes could be the next Messi.Narrated in turn by Mark and his work colleague Lakesha Williams, the novel is both a tale of family and migration, and an international adventure story that implicates the brothers in the beauty and ugliness of football, the perils and promises of international business, and the dark history of transatlantic money-making.As only he can do, Joseph O''Neill investigates the legacy of colonialism in the context of family love, global capitalism, and the dreaming individual.''Among the best novels I’ve read in a long time'' BILL BUFORD‘Delightful, funny … rapidly told in masterful prose''FINANCIAL TIMES''Moving … enjoyable'' THE TIMES''This has all the velocity and swerve of an unstoppable free kick''PUBLISHERS WEEKLYJoseph O’Neill''s novel Netherland was longlisted for the 2008 Booker Prize

While searching for his missing father, Anthony Julian embarks on a terrifying journey into the Earth's interior. There he discovers a subterranean world, where descendants of the Roman Army suffer under a totalitarian regime in which individualism is completely obliterated by telepathic means. Refusing to join this rigidly controlled society, Anthony must fight to save his father and find a route to the surface - or perish.First published in 1935, the genre-transcending political and psychological themes of Land Under England put it far ahead of its time.

Criminals, drifters, beggars, the homeless, immigrants, prostitutes, tramping artisans, street entertainers, abandoned children, navvies, and families fallen on hard times – a whole underclass of people on the margins of society passed through Victorian l

A masterly collection of eleven stories about the way we live now from the best-selling author of Netherland.From bourgeois facial hair trends to parental sleep deprivation, O''Neill closely observes the mores of his characters, whose vacillations and second thoughts expose the mysterious pettiness, the underlying violence, and, sometimes, the surprising beauty of ordinary life in the early twenty-first century. A lonely wedding guest talks to a goose; a pair of poets struggle over whether to participate in a "pardon Edward Snowden" verse petition; a cowardly husband lets his wife face a possible intruder in their home; a potential co-op renter in New York City can''t find anyone to give him a character reference. On the surface, these men and women may only be in mild trouble, but O''Neill reminds us of the real, secretly political consequences of our internal monologues in these perfectly made, fiercely modern stories. No writer is more incisive about the strange world we live in now, and the laugh-out-loud vulnerability of his people is just as well fodder for tears.

Seven of the best recent short stories, disassembled by their authors.An innovative anthology revealing the inspiration, the ideals and the work involved in a great short story. Reverse Engineering brings together contemporary classic stories with their authors'' discussions of how they were written.