Description

The new novel from the bestselling author of The Idiot follows one young woman’s quest for self-knowledge, as she travels abroad and tests the limits of her newfound adulthood.

‘Elif Batuman is the queen of the campus novel… Enchanting’ Sunday Times

SELIN IS THE LUCKIEST PERSON IN HER FAMILY:

The only one who was born in America and got to go to Harvard. Now it’s her second year, and Selin knows she has to make it count. The first order of business: to figure out the meaning of everything that happened over the summer…

On the plus side, her life feels like the plot of an exciting novel. On the other hand, why do so many novels have crazy, abandoned women in them? And how does one live a life as interesting as a novel – a life worthy of becoming a novel – without turning into a crazy, abandoned woman oneself?

‘Stupendous… Hilarious… Batuman is a genius’ Vogue

‘This novel wins you over in a million micro-observations’ New York Times

‘Searingly smart’ Evening Standard

Publisher Review

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* *