Disappointed city, living for those tired of their countries. Here's a slice of that Northwest London skyline as seen from a train: ungentrified, ungentrifiable, boom and bust never come here. As she did in her terrific debut "White Teeth," Smith gives us an ambitious city novel in "NW." Smith structures her story around the lives of four people, now in their 30s, who grew up in the same subsidized housing estate in Northwest London, definitely not one of the posher districts of the city where Wills and Kate might party in their downtime. Like a stalk of late-summer corn that's blighted at its very tip, "NW's" narrative is four-fifths ripe, golden deliciousness, one-fifth barren cob. That's my advice, at least in the case of Zadie Smith's just-published novel "NW." Prominent authors like Martin Amis, Tom Wolfe, Michael Chabon and Zadie Smith have kept readers waiting for a while, which means, of course, that our expectations are as high as an elephant's eye. MAUREEN CORRIGAN, BYLINE: This fall book season is bristling with lots of new novels that share the distinction of being long-awaited. Our book critic Maureen Corrigan has been considering the crucial question: Was it worth the wait? This week, her new novel, called "NW," came out in this country. Although she's been writing a lot of nonfiction recently, Zadie Smith's last novel, "On Beauty," came out seven years ago, which is a long time in the anxious world of publishing.
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