Either/Or

Reviews / Votes

Our funniest overthinker - and the queen of the campus novel... Selin is a droll and disarming narrator, and takes her place as one of the finest hapless scholars in the literary canon. -- Johanna Thomas-Corr * Sunday Times * Batuman has a gift for making the universe seem, somehow, like the benevolent and witty literary seminar you wish it were . . . This novel wins you over in a million micro-observations. -- Dwight Garner * The New York Times * A richly suggestive and amusing book. -- Jonathan Derbyshire * Financial Times * Such an enchanting writer. -- Johanna Thomas-Corr * Sunday Times * Either/Or is both an entertaining campus novel and an engaging disquisition on the very nature and purpose of novels. * Financial Times, *Summer Reads of 2022* * Stupendous . . . hilarious... Batuman is a genius, rendering human folly at its most colorful and borderline surreal -- Lauren Mechling * Vogue * The central pleasure of reading Elif Batuman's ferociously intelligent fiction...[is] the thrill of encountering things you already half-knew, rendered in language with lyrical precision... hopefully, there will be a third installment of the adventures of Elif Batuman's brilliantly modern picaro. * Times Literary Supplement * Wonderfully idiosyncratic... Charming -- Alex Clark * Guardian * Delightful... Batuman has a formidable deadpan wit... Selin is not only an astute observer but displays a touching capacity for awe. * Spectator * A charming, mordantly funny follow-up to her first novel... triumphal. * Daily Mail *