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"Sometimes you do not truly observe something until you study it in reverse," writes Karim Issar upon arrival to New York City from Qatar in 1999. Fluent in numbers, logic, and business jargon yet often baffled by human connection, the young financial wizard soon creates a computer program named Kapitoil that predicts oil futures and reaps record profits for his company.
At first an introspective loner adrift in New York's social scenes, he anchors himself to his legendary boss Derek Schrub and Rebecca, a sensitive, disillusioned colleague who may understand him better than he does himself. Her influence, and his father's disapproval of Karim's Americanization, cause him to question the moral implications of Kapitoil, moving him toward a decision that will determine his future, his firm's, and to whomand wherehis loyalties lie.
"Starred Review. It's a slick first novel that beautifully captures a time that, in retrospect, seems tragically naïve." - Publishers Weekly
"Starred Review. Best of all, however, is simply being inside Karim's head as he ponders Jackson Pollock's paintings, baseball, programming, and the mysteries of love and life in the U.S." - Booklist
"What a wonderful character Karim is - the hapless, hilarious, math-obsessed hero of Teddy Wayne's first novel. Kapitoil is a delight. Who knew oil futures could be such fun?" - Joshua Henkin, author of Swimming Across The Hudson and Matrimony
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Teddy Wayne is the author of six novels and a winner of a Whiting Writers' Award and an NEA Creative Writing Fellowship as well as a finalist for the Young Lions Fiction Award, PEN/Bingham Prize, and Dayton Literary Peace Prize. A frequent contributor to The New Yorker and a former columnist for the New York Times, he has taught at Columbia University and Washington University in St. Louis. He lives in Brooklyn with his family.
The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people ...
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