Join Amazon Prime and get unlimited Free One-Day Delivery. Already a member? Sign in.

 

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
   
More Buying Choices
31 used & new from £0.61
Have one to sell? Sell yours here
 
   
De Niro's Game
 
See larger image 
Share your own customer images
Publisher: learn how customers can search inside this book.

De Niro's Game (Paperback)

by Rawi Hage (Author)
4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
RRP: £11.99
Price: £8.39 & this item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions
You Save: £3.60 (30%)
In stock.
Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk. Gift-wrap available.

Want guaranteed delivery by Tuesday, July 7? Choose Express delivery at checkout. See Details
25 new from £0.61 4 used from £0.61 2 collectible from £1.90

Frequently Bought Together

De Niro's Game + Netherland + The White Tiger
Price For All Three: £16.35

Show availability and shipping details

  • This item: De Niro's Game by Rawi Hage

    In stock.
    Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk.
    This item Delivered FREE in the UK with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions

  • Netherland by Joseph O'Neill

    In stock.
    Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk.
    Eligible for FREE UK delivery on orders over £5 with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions

  • The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

    In stock.
    Dispatched from and sold by Amazon.co.uk.
    Eligible for FREE UK delivery on orders over £5 with Super Saver Delivery. See details and conditions

Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

by Stieg Larsson
4.1 out of 5 stars (156)  £3.99
Netherland

Netherland

by Joseph O'Neill
3.1 out of 5 stars (98)  £4.12
The White Tiger

The White Tiger

by Aravind Adiga
3.7 out of 5 stars (98)  £3.84
The Reluctant Fundamentalist

The Reluctant Fundamentalist

by Mohsin Hamid
3.5 out of 5 stars (92)  £4.50
The Girl Who Played with Fire

The Girl Who Played with Fire

by Stieg Larsson
4.5 out of 5 stars (70)  £3.86
› Explore similar items

Product details

  • Paperback: 288 pages
  • Publisher: Old Street (1 Aug 2007)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 190584722X
  • ISBN-13: 978-1905847228
  • Product Dimensions: 21.2 x 13.8 x 2.4 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 329,747 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    •  Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?

Product Description

FT Magazine
"De Niro's Game is the most subtly nuanced, psychologically compelling book about the corrosive effects of war to have been written for a long time..."

Synopsis
An extraordinarily powerful story which transcends the media coverage of the Middle East, "De Niro's Game" is a breathtaking, timely and moving novel about two young men coming of age in war-torn Beirut. While Bassam becomes obsessed with leaving Beirut, George amasses power in the militia-ruled underworld, and lives a life of violence and crime for profit. Their friendship is tested and inevitably their paths collide, explosively and tragically. "Intensely cinematic, his prose style jumps between fast-paced action, where the language hits the page like the rat-tat-tat of gunfire, and liquid metaphors that languidly twist, turn and coil one after another." - Daily Star, Lebanon.

Suggested Tags from Similar Products

 (What's this?)
Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
Check a corresponding box or enter your own tags in the field below
(1)
(1)
(1)

Your tags: Add your first tag
 
See most popular tags

What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

De Niro's Game
92% buy the item featured on this page:
De Niro's Game 4.4 out of 5 stars (5)
£8.39
Cockroach
3% buy
Cockroach
£8.99
The Book of Chameleons
2% buy
The Book of Chameleons 4.5 out of 5 stars (8)
£5.99
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo
2% buy
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo 4.1 out of 5 stars (156)
£3.99
Explore similar items
 

Customer Reviews

5 Reviews
5 star:
 (3)
4 star:
 (1)
3 star:
 (1)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.4 out of 5 stars (5 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
Share your thoughts with other customers:
Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Poignant, 9 Jul 2008
This review is from: De Niro's Game (Paperback)
This is an exceptional book and absolutely worth the hype - not something I concede very often. Hage masterfully conveys a devastating convergence of youthful hedonism and malaise, imbuing his protagonists' plight with a sense of inevitability, as they self destruct in their war torn city.

His writing is at times punchy, at others poetic: it's an interesting approach, and very effective. The jarringingly elegant expression of some of the most brutal passages makes for a shocking impact.

Well worth reading.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Powerful, 24 Jun 2008
By C. Wellbelove (London) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
This review is from: De Niro's Game (Paperback)
A worthy winner of the IMPAC Award, De Niro's Game deals with the Lebanese conflict with objectivity and sensitivity. Hage brilliantly demonstrates the effect that war has on everyday life, and the often desperate measures that people are forced to take in order to survive. Through the differing plights of Bassam and George we are exposed to the atrocities of wartime and also given a powerful insight into the conflict and the Arab world as a whole.

The clarity of the writing allows the reader to build a clear picture and historical understanding of the events while the occasional poetic sections lend a lyricism which is strikingly at odds with the action. These linguistic nuances are all the more remarkable when one considers that Hage is writing in his third language. De Niro's Game is an original story set within an under-reported conflict, fully deserving of it's critical acclaim.


Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)



 
4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars The Stranger in a foreign land., 23 Jun 2008
By William Rycroft "blogs @ Just William's Luck" (Hertfordshire, UK) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: De Niro's Game (Paperback)
The Impac Dublin Literary Award is literature's richest prize. 100,000 (almost £80,000) is not to be sneezed at, and when a début novelist beats off big-hitters like Roth, Atwood, Updike and Pynchon I'm interested. If it hadn't been for the prize there's little chance that I would even have glanced at this book which, with its hideous cover, looks like one of those airport murder/thrillers. You'll notice the crack that runs to the bottom of the page and which reminded me of Doris Salcedo's Shibboleth at Tate Modern. She said that the fissure she opened in the Turbine Hall's floor represented the danger of crossing borders; the danger of rejection and racial hatred, which is a useful parallel to have with Hage's novel.

Set in Lebanon during the Civil War of the 70's and 80's we follow the trajectories of two childhood friends Bassam and George. The early pages describe with cinematic flair the exuberance of their youth, even in this city destroyed by 'ten thousand bombs'.

'Then we hopped back on the motorbike and drove under the falling bullets, oblivious. We drove through the noise of military chants and a thousand radio stations all claiming victory. We stared at the short skirts of female warriors and drove beside schoolgirl's thighs. We were aimless, beggars and thieves, horny Arabs with curly hair and open shirts and Marlboro packs rolled in our sleeves, dropouts, ruthless nihilists with guns, bad breath, and long American jeans.'

Not knowing an awful lot about the conflict myself, Hage shows in simple detail the divisions between Muslim and Christian, the various factions in the battle for power and the States that stand behind them but he focuses on the individuals. Bassam dreams of leaving the war torn streets for Rome, whereas George finds himself drawn into the Christian militia. The two of them work together initially on a scam at George's workplace involving poker machines. With this Bassam hopes to fund his flight to Europe but it ends up becoming the leverage a local militia leader needs to enlist George, a willing participant at a time when the only way to command respect and ensure your own safety is with a gun in your hand.

These are men inured to violence because of their familiarity with it. De Niro's game is of course Russian Roulette (from The Deer Hunter) a game of chance which serves as the perfect metaphor for the situation in Beirut. When lives can be lost so cheaply there is very little these young men can think to do apart from escape or take part. Even when his own mother is killed by a falling bomb Bassam finds himself feeling release rather than sadness. Maybe this accounts for the rather deadened tone to Hage's writing. It is a curious mixture; the filmic quality early on making some passages read with the black and white simplicity of a screenplay but every now and then Hage will add a poetic flourish. These flights of fancy increase as the novel progresses and with decreasing effect. I'm not sure that the world was crying out for a poetic description of urination ('I stood above the toilet, undid my belt buckle, and slowly, urgently, I let the metamorphosed red wine burst and flow in the curve of a single yellow rainbow').

Bassam will eventually make his escape, to Paris, where his rebellious leanings find ample expression in the city synonymous with revolution. It is here he comes face to face with racism and finds himself resorting to the only form of defence he knows; attack. Here he also meets George's half-sister Rhea, who is desperate to know as much as she can about George from his closest friend.

'I skipped many things about George, and when I saw how happy she was I changed names, I planted trees, I painted the concrete houses in our old neighbourhood in tropical colours, I made people dance and laugh, even under the falling bombs.'

But he can't pretend forever. Bassam begins reading a copy of The Stranger by Albert Camus whose hero is man not unlike himself. In the same way that Mersault is awakened from his disconnection by killing 'The Arab', Bassam will confront his past in order to make any progress into his future.

I wanted to enjoy this book more but Bassam is a character with very little capacity to connect, which makes for a frustrating narrator. The prose can be either too simplistic or too florid and the plot begins to stretch credulity as it develops, especially when we reach Paris. However, Hage's descriptions of Beirut and the corrosive effects of war and violence are spot on and he creates some fantastic images. The games we play as children can take on a hideous dimension in conflict, and the human angle that Hage shows provides a sobering aspect to the images we see everyday on the television from war torn cities around the globe. Just as many people saw the images of 9/11 as clips from some Hollywood movie these two boys find that violence, even when it happens right in front of you, can be banal and clichéd.
Comment Comment | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)


Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
 
 
 
Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Celebrate the Bullet
Lebanese-Canadian author Hage mines the rich and tragic history of the Lebanese Civil War for this debut novel, featuring two Christian childhood friends who gradually grow apart... Read more
Published 6 months ago by A. Ross

5.0 out of 5 stars A good read
I disagree with the last reviewer's take that the main character/narrator was hard to connect with. I didn't find that. And why do we need to "connect" with him anyway? Read more
Published 12 months ago by ukburke

Only search this product's reviews


Customer Discussions

 Beta (What's this?)
This product's forum (0 discussions)
  Discussion Replies Latest Post
  No discussions yet

Ask questions, Share opinions, Gain insight
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
  [Cancel]


Active discussions in related forums
   
Related forums

Listmania!

Create a Listmania! list

Look for similar items by category

Look for similar items by subject









i.e., each product must be in subject 1 AND subject 2 AND ...

Feedback

The Body Shop

The Body Shop - Vitamin C Skin Boost
Protect and boost your glow with The Body Shop Vitamin C Skin Boost.

›Shop The Body Shop

  

More From Rawi Hage

Cockroach

Cockroach by Rawi Hage

During a bitterly cold winter in a snowy northern city, a... Read more
£14.99 £8.99

 

Train Hard...Play Hard

Nike, Gola, Converse, and more
Gear up with up to 60% off athletic and outdoor shoes.

›Shop now

  

Treat Someone

Amazon.co.uk Gift Certificates--available in any amount from £5 to £500 With an Amazon.co.uk Gift Certificate, you can get them what they want (even if you don't know what that is).

›Learn more about Gift Certificates

  
Ad

Where's My Stuff?

Delivery and Returns

Need Help?

Your Recent History

  (What's this?)
You have no recently viewed items or searches.

After viewing product detail pages or search results, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in.

Look to the right column to find helpful suggestions for your shopping session.
Continue Shopping: Top Sellers

amazon.co.uk Amazon Home
International Sites:  United States  |  Germany  |  France  |  Japan  |  Canada  |  China
Business Programs: Sell on Amazon  |  Fulfilment by Amazon  |  Join Associates  |  Join Advantage
Customer Service  |  Help  |  View Basket  |  Your Account
About Amazon.co.uk  |  Careers at Amazon
Conditions of Use & Sale |  Privacy Notice  © 1996-2009, Amazon.com, Inc. and its affiliates