Not worth the time. Dreary story about a loser. ( )

Small novel about globalization, whereby an American salesman in his mid-50s hopes to recoup his business luck by selling an advanced IT package to the king of Saudi Arabia for use in his advanced city in the desert that is not quite taking off. Alan needs the money to pay off his many debtors and advance his daughter’s school career. He gets sent to Saudi-Arabia because he once met a distant cousin to the Saudi king, which supposedly gives him and his consortium a cutting edge in the business.

But once there, Alan and his young team of tech whizz kids (capable of conjuring up a hologram of one of their London based colleagues) find themselves in a huge circus tent, with hardly any internet and no-one to attend to them in a city consisting of a collection of empty buildings of marble and stones. The vacuousness extends for weeks. The king can come any moment. Alan interacts with a Danish consultant lady, who takes him to some drunken orgies. But Alan can’t get it up anymore. He keeps on trying to write to his daughter in drunken stupors. The only thing going for him is his relationship with a local driver in a clapped-out car. Alan tells him jokes, to great acclaim. Meanwhile we get a perfect description of the kind of collapse of Industrial America, where all jobs and manufacturing has been outsourced to Asia, over time. The back cloth to Trump’s rise. At some stage Alan joins his driver to the latter’s ancestral home in the desert, and goes on a hunting party at night, where he almost shoots a young herdsboy (mistaking him for a wolf). Next Alan receives surgery on a lymphoma in his neck, and then engages with the Saudi female surgeon.

The end is swift and devastating – the king visits, the hologram show works perfectly, but the King ignores Alan, proceeds to the next door building, is seen leaving shaking hands of Chinese businessman, and then it turns out that Alan’s consortium has won no contract. Alan decides to hang on to see whether it is nevertheless possible to gain some next contract. End.

Wow, this is so vacuous. It confirms all my prejudice against Saudi Arabia as a place of no interest whats-o-ever. And Eggers paints a shrill picture of the globalized world – devoid of values or feelings, whereby modern-day (migrant) slaves do the work and the elite enjoys a completely morally decrepit life. And America does not matter anymore. ( )

For the life of me I have no idea what the point of this book was. I should have been warned when I saw on the cover that it was one of The New York Time Book Reviews 10 best books of the year, for me at least this is never a recommendation, for a book I will enjoy. I certainly did not enjoy this book of nothing. I really wish I had read some of the reviews on Goodreads first, I would never have bought the book. I had no idea the author was some 1960's author which explains a lot regarding the main characters disillusionment with the last 8 years. What is worse is that I never cared about Alan Clay the main character, and it seemed like neither did the Author. ( )

Really liked this book. It felt light and airy even though the topics were sad and lonely. I guess it seemed like a short story that was inflated into a novel. That doesn't sound good, but actually I loved it. ( )

Meet Alan Clay, an American salesman in his mid-fifties. He is in debt, his credit is bad, and his career is in decline. His daughter and ex-wife are not getting along. He is becoming increasingly aware of his shortcomings, though he remains optimistic. Alan’s company has sent him and a team of three young consultants to Jeddah to try to win the information technology infrastructure contract for King Abdullah Economic City, a sprawling new development in the middle of the Saudi Arabian desert. They are all set to meet with the king to demonstrate the company’s holographic conferencing capability. The only problem is that the king is repeatedly unavailable, and the team is setup in a tent with limited wi-fi and no food. Alan believes if he can just sell this contract, he can get his life back on track.

Eggers has written a book filled with subtle humor and irony. Alan’s actions have contributed to his predicament, but he fails to acknowledge it. He is trying to sell virtual technology in a city that may never be fully developed to a king who repeatedly fails to appear. So, Alan drifts aimlessly. He tours the construction zone, encounters a few women, and, in one of the highlights of the book, forms a friendship with a local driver.

This book is, in part, a social commentary on globalization and the associated economic impacts. It is also a deep character study of a man who used to manufacture and sell physical products (bicycles), but now struggles to remain relevant in an increasingly virtual, downsized, and outsourced world. Alan is presented as somewhat of a holographic image himself, a person whose role has faded and who keeps making poor decisions. He tries to point to an external reason for his troubles, a growth on his neck, but the real problem lies deeper within. He is still trying to apply old rules to a new game.

The plot is sparse, the prose is spare, and the pace matches the on-again-off-again schedule for meeting with the king. Eggers explores several aspects Saudi Arabian culture through the eyes of an American, which may hold a few surprises for readers. I can’t speak to the accuracy, but Eggers appears to have done his homework in fact-checking with those in the know. I found it clever and entertaining.
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