SOURCE: Longmore, Zenga. “Fairy-Sweary-Land.” Spectator 284, no. 8947 (29 January 2000): 47.

In the following negative review, Longmore argues that the characters in White Teeth are not only unrealistically profound and introspective, but also unusually profane.

Zadie Smith is a very impressive woman. She is divinely pretty, 24 years old, has a double first in English at Cambridge, and if that's not enough, she has written a hetty great book on multicultural north west London [White Teeth] for which she was paid a staggeringly large commission. Sadly, the book lacks the brilliance of its author.

Reader, beware, you are about to hear a lot more of Zadie. Rumour has it that her publishers are sparing no expense to hype her to the white teeth. I predict that, in a few years' time, students all over the country will be poring over Zadie's opus in an attempt to ‘re-examine the marginalisation of the multi-ethnic urbanisation...