
Waxwings
Jonathan Raban(Author)
Picador (Publisher)
Will be published approx. on 8. October 2026
Book
Paperback/Softback
320 pages
978-1-0350-9153-9 (ISBN)
Description
Longlisted for the 2003 Man Booker Prize
'A treasure' - The Guardian
'A remarkable work' - Literary Review
At the turn of the millennium, two immigrants are drawn to the United States by their own versions of the American Dream.
For Tom Janeway - a Hungarian-born English intellectual most at home with his books - it's the family he thought he'd never have. For Chick - an illegal alien newly escaped from a cargo container - it's the land of plenty he imagined back in China.
But as the stock market hits a new high, anti-globalist riots break out in the streets, a terrorist is arrested and a child disappears, the two men's dreams collide in a way neither could have anticipated. Unjustly accused of a horrific crime, estranged from his wife and his beloved young son, Tom's life is rapidly unravelling. Chick, meanwhile, has a burgeoning business by day but no safe place to lay his bed at night. For both, the New World proves surprisingly full of old ways.
Moving, funny and hugely entertaining, Jonathan Raban's Waxwings brilliantly captures the landscape and life of contemporary America.
Part of the Picador Collection, a series celebrating fifty years of Picador books and showcasing the best of modern literature.
'A treasure' - The Guardian
'A remarkable work' - Literary Review
At the turn of the millennium, two immigrants are drawn to the United States by their own versions of the American Dream.
For Tom Janeway - a Hungarian-born English intellectual most at home with his books - it's the family he thought he'd never have. For Chick - an illegal alien newly escaped from a cargo container - it's the land of plenty he imagined back in China.
But as the stock market hits a new high, anti-globalist riots break out in the streets, a terrorist is arrested and a child disappears, the two men's dreams collide in a way neither could have anticipated. Unjustly accused of a horrific crime, estranged from his wife and his beloved young son, Tom's life is rapidly unravelling. Chick, meanwhile, has a burgeoning business by day but no safe place to lay his bed at night. For both, the New World proves surprisingly full of old ways.
Moving, funny and hugely entertaining, Jonathan Raban's Waxwings brilliantly captures the landscape and life of contemporary America.
Part of the Picador Collection, a series celebrating fifty years of Picador books and showcasing the best of modern literature.
Reviews / Votes
[Waxwings] may well be one of the best accounts ever written of an American era * Kirkus * A generous, affirming novel . . . Terrific * The New York Times Book Review * A treasure -- Colin Greenland * The Guardian * A remarkable work * Literary Review * A tour de force * The Washington Post Book World * Hugely satisfying * The Independent on Sunday * A delicious social comedy . . . Waxwings is also an elegant meditation on immigrant America * The Boston GLobe * Waxwings teems with juicy, funny characters emblematic of their time and place * Entertainment Weekly * Waxwings is zestfully written and full of deftly humorous touches * The Independent * A keenly observant, ironic, yet at heart sympathetic exploration of what America has promised and provided * Chicago Tribune *More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Pan Macmillan
Target group
Interest Age: From 18 years
Product notice
Paperback (UK-B)
Dimensions
Height: 197 mm
Width: 130 mm
ISBN-13
978-1-0350-9153-9 (9781035091539)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Jonathan Raban
Waxwings
A moving and funny tale of displacement and belonging in contemporary America
E-Book
08/2017
Picador
€13.49
Available for download
Person
Jonathan Raban was the author of over a dozen books, both fiction and non-fiction, including Passage to Juneau, Bad Land, Hunting Mister Heartbreak, Coasting, Old Glory, Arabia, Soft City, Waxwings and Surveillance. Over the span of six decades, he won the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Royal Society of Literature's Heinemann Award, the Thomas Cook Award, the PEN West Creative Nonfiction Award, the Pacific Northwest Booksellers' Award, and the Governor's Award of the State of Washington. His work appeared in The New Yorker, Granta, Harpers, The New York Review of Books, Outside, Atlantic Monthly, New Republic, The London Review of Books, and other magazines.
In 1990 Raban, a British citizen, moved from London to Seattle, where he lived with his daughter until his death in 2023.
In 1990 Raban, a British citizen, moved from London to Seattle, where he lived with his daughter until his death in 2023.