''Fieldwork'' is a 2007 novel by American journalist

Mischa Berlinski Mischa Berlinski (born 1973 in New York, United States) is an American author. His first novel, ''Fieldwork'', was a finalist for the 2007 National Book Award. In 2008 Berlinski won a $50,000 Whiting Award, given to writers showing early promise ...

. It was published by

Farrar, Straus and Giroux Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG) is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger Williams Straus Jr. and John C. Farrar. FSG is known for publishing literary books, and its authors have won numerous awards, including Pulitzer P ...

and was a finalist that year for the

National Book Award The National Book Awards (NBA) are a set of annual U.S. literary awards. At the final National Book Awards Ceremony every November, the National Book Foundation presents the National Book Awards and two lifetime achievement awards to authors. ...

, eventually losing out to

Denis Johnson Denis Hale Johnson (July 1, 1949 – May 24, 2017) was an American novelist, short-story writer, and poet. He is perhaps best known for his debut short story collection, ''Jesus' Son (short story collection), Jesus' Son'' (1992). His most succes ...

's '' Tree of Smoke''.

Synopsis

Set in

Thailand Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...

, the novel is told from the point of view of a fictional narrator named Mischa Berlinski. It tells the story of a tribe called the Dyalo, a family of Protestant missionaries attempting to convert them to Christianity, and an anthropologist who is studying the tribe and who murders one of the missionaries and then commits suicide in prison.

Reception

The book received strongly positive reviews. In the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

'',

Tim Rutten Timothy Calder Rutten (April 8, 1950 – September 8, 2022) was an American journalist with the ''Los Angeles Daily News''. He worked for the ''Los Angeles Times'' for nearly 40 years between 1971 and 2011. Rutten was married to Leslie Abramson ...

called the book "a notable piece of first fiction -- at once deeply serious about questions of consequence and refreshingly mindful of traditional storytelling conventions." (Rutten did criticize what he called the author's "casual obeisance to fashionable

postmodernism Postmodernism encompasses a variety of artistic, Culture, cultural, and philosophical movements that claim to mark a break from modernism. They have in common the conviction that it is no longer possible to rely upon previous ways of depicting ...

" in choosing to use his name for the fictional narrator.)

"Faith and Reason in Thailand"
''

'', February 7, 2007. Lara Tupper, in '' The Believer'', described it as "a clever book, chock-full of

David Foster Wallace David Foster Wallace (February 21, 1962 – September 12, 2008) was an American writer and professor who published novels, short stories, and essays. He is best known for his 1996 novel ''Infinite Jest'', which ''Time (magazine), Time'' magazine ...

–esque footnotes and moments of direct address." ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publis ...

Boyd Tonkin Boyd Tonkin Hon. FRSL is an English writer, journalist and literary critic. He was the literary editor of ''The Independent'' newspaper from 1996 to 2013. A long-time proponent of foreign-language literature, he is the author of ''The 100 Best No ...

described it as "an updated

Somerset Maugham William Somerset Maugham ( ; 25 January 1874 – 16 December 1965) was an English writer, known for his plays, novels and short stories. Born in Paris, where he spent his first ten years, Maugham was schooled in England and went to a German un ...

yarn", " sh in its landscapes, dense in its ideas, always startlingly nimble and witty". A less positive review came from Sophia Asare of ''

Entertainment Weekly ''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American online magazine, digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, ...

'', who gave the book a B-minus grade, calling it "a rich yet cumbersome travelogue". However, a second ''Entertainment Weekly'' article about the book, written by

Stephen King Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American author. Dubbed the "King of Horror", he is widely known for his horror novels and has also explored other genres, among them Thriller (genre), suspense, crime fiction, crime, scienc ...

and entitled "How to Bury a Book", was more laudatory: "This is a great story. It has an exotic locale, mystery, and a narrative voice full of humor and sadness. Reading Fieldwork is like discovering an unpublished

Robertson Davies William Robertson Davies (28 August 1913 – 2 December 1995) was a Canadian novelist, playwright, critic, journalist, and professor. He was one of Canada's best known and most popular authors and one of its most distinguished " men of letters" ...

novel; as with Davies, you can't stop reading until midnight (good), and you don't hate yourself in the morning (better)." King went on to criticize the publisher for its choice of a bland title and cover design, asking, "Why, why, why would a company publish a book this good and then practically demand that people not read it? Why should this book go to waste?" King's column yielded additional attention and sales for ''Fieldwork''; when Berlinski was awarded a 2008

Whiting Writers' Award The Whiting Award is an American award presented annually to ten emerging writers in fiction, nonfiction, poetry and drama Drama is the specific Mode (literature), mode of fiction Mimesis, represented in performance: a Play (theatre), play, ...

, he commented to an interviewer about his "luck" that "Stephen King, the most famous writer in the world, picked up my book because he didn't like the cover."Jocelyn McClurg and Bob Minzesheimer
"Book Buzz: Marriage, sickness and luck"
''

USA Today ''USA Today'' (often stylized in all caps) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth in 1980 and launched on September 14, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headq ...

'', October 29, 2008.

References

{{Reflist, 30em 2007 American novels Novels set in Thailand Farrar, Straus and Giroux books 2007 debut novels