With 'The Nix', Nathan Hill reveals himself to be a worthy successor to Jonathan Franzen as an astute observer of the dysfunctional middle class in the contemporary United States. In this hefty novel, Hill pulls off the difficult feat of making the reader laugh at the foibles of Samuel Andresen-Anderson whilst eliciting our sympathies for this neurotic professor's inability to come to terms with an unusually dysfunctional childhood marked by maternal abandonment and unrequited first love. A tremendous wisdom and lucidity about the human condition permeates 'The Nix' without ever succumbing
to predictable, simplistic conclusions about how things are 'supposed to' occur in life. Despite the tragic undercurrents of 'The Nix', the very unpredictability of life's events is an endless source of hope, where even the supernatural may have its place in coming to terms with fate. Never dull, always stimulating and surprising.
The mirage of happiness
With 'The Nix', Nathan Hill reveals himself to be a worthy successor to Jonathan Franzen as an astute observer of the dysfunctional middle class in the contemporary United States. In this hefty novel, Hill pulls off the difficult feat of making the reader laugh at the foibles of Samuel Andresen-Anderson whilst eliciting our sympathies for this neurotic professor's inability to come to terms with an unusually dysfunctional childhood marked by maternal abandonment and unrequited first love. A tremendous wisdom and lucidity about the human condition permeates 'The Nix' without ever succumbing to predictable, simplistic conclusions about how things are 'supposed to' occur in life. Despite the tragic undercurrents of 'The Nix', the very unpredictability of life's events is an endless source of hope, where even the supernatural may have its place in coming to terms with fate. Never dull, always stimulating and surprising.