“A young woman’s body floats in the Dubai marina...” Jamie O’Connell’s debut novel, told from six points of view between Dubai and Ireland, perfectly captures the seedy underbelly of the flashiest city on earth, a tiered society where money is power and those without one have none of the other. It’s a place as disturbing as it is fascinating (my sister lives there, which is what drew me to the book). Among the main characters are Emiratis, western ex-pats and migrant workers (an Egyptian maid, a Pakistani taxi driver and a Russian sex worker), and the nuanced portraits O’Connell draws of them are full of true-to-life detail - the excess of a Dubai brunch, the hardship of life as an agency worker, and a very famous stunt involving an unnamed movie star.

Sadly the “mystery” element of the book falls short. The connection between our six protagonists becomes clear very quickly, and with it the identity of perpetrator, and I found the ending rushed and unsatisfying - albeit, on reflection, probably a realistic one. Still, this is a promising debut, and I’d be interested to see what O’Connell does next.

A disappointing read, something about the style of the writing is very unappealing to me, an odd mixture of cramming too much information too soon about shallow characters and a disorienting mass of settings.

I enjoyed the story and found the setting of Dubai very interesting having visited there a few years ago. I was aware of the immigrant population who were mostly taxi drivers and maids but did not fully appreciate the precarious lives they lead. Although it is well written, there were a few loose ends that needed to be tied up but my main issue was the stereotypical characters.

I was unable to read and therefore review this before it's archive date. The concept sounded amazing, and I hope that it does well!

The summary of this book caught my attention and I was eager to get started. However I found this book difficult to read due to the style in which it was written. Each chapter is narrated from the point of view of different characters and their stories are linked by the death of the Emirate women who's body is found floating in the Marina. I enjoyed how this book related about life in Dubai

I would like to thank Netgalley and Random House UK, Transworld Publishers for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for a fair and honest review.

This novel took me back to Dubai thanks to its vibrant settings. Honestly, that's the only thing that kept me reading. I think the storyline missed focus on what really mattered. The writing style and language just wasn't for me.

Diving for Pearls by Jamie O'Connell

There's something intensely fascinating but at the same time also intensely repulsive about Dubai. Such an obscene show of wealth, built on the misery of others.
Diving for Pearls starts when a girl's body is found floating in the Marina. It turns out that she is from a wealthy Emirate family and from here on in we're introduced to the class hierachy in Dubai. At the top come the wealthy Emirates, followed by wealthy Western business people and tourists and the bottom of the pile is all the hired help and working immigrants who actually do all the work building the place and keeping everything running smoothly.
We meet various characters who have come to Dubai to earn money. Siobhan and Martin from Ireland are living the high life. Martin is always away working and Siobhan just spends, spends, spends – but interestingly, most of the designer goods she buys are fakes, which just amplifies the whole 'smoke and mirrors' aspect to places like Dubai.
Siobhan's live-in Nanny/Maid, Gete, is from Ethiopia and whilst she is treated better by the Irish family than some of the maids she knows (ie, she's not raped by the master of the house) she still has had her passport taken from her as soon as she entered the country by a work agency.
Siobhan's brother comes over from Ireland to visit and whilst he is keen to put his troubled past in Ireland behind him, she wants to find him work as a personal trainer in Dubai so he can enjoy her quality of life.
Trevor is a likeable character who manages to bridge the void between those who have and those who have not. Whereas Siobhan is annoyingly grasping and her sons are spoilt beyond belief.

Tahir is a taxi driver from Pakistan who works incredibly hard in order to make a better future for his wife and daughters back home. But his tenuous link to the death of the girl (she was a passenger in his taxi on the night she died) makes him an ideal scapegoat for the Police, even though their evidence points elsewhere. He is jailed, without any legal help or help from the Embassy and it's heart-breaking that he knows that he is being held responsible and can't do anything to help himself.

This is such a great book and really marks out the huge gulf between the glitter and gold facade of Dubai and it's dirty and corrupt foudations.
Considering that most of the characters come to better them selves, it's. depressing to see that they become trapped and unable to leave.

* Thanks to Random House UK and Netgalley for the ARC.

For me this book did not live up to the synopsis. I found the writing style very disjointed and the storyline very confusing. Sorry not for me.

I have to say I’m disappointed with Diving for Pearls by Jamie O’Connell. I struggled to identify a substantial plot and I couldn’t take to any of the characters. The style is too haphazard for me and I couldn’t recommend it.

The only enjoyable aspect is the dual settings of Dubai and Ireland. The contrasting lifestyles and cultures is an interesting study.

My thanks to Netgalley and Penguin Random House for the complimentary copy.

I found this book really readable, hence the 3 stars. The characters were interesting but not fully formed or with any real depth. In fact I found the Asian woman associated with prostitution trope tiresome. I was a little confused about who the story was really about. The more interesting characters certainly weren't the focus and their stories weren't tied up at the end. It was like this book was missing the last fifty or so pages. It also seemed confused about which genre it was. Not the finest debut novel I've read.

My expectations for Diving for Pearls were already high and from the beginning the book reminded me of two things I loved: Baz Lurhman's adaptation of The Great Gatsby and Colm McCann's novel Let the Great World Spin. At the heart of both is the spectacle, and the reality behind a famous image, and Diving for Pearls opens with dual images, the "two purring engines" of the opening line of the novel hinting at the driving, opposed, forces behind the book: the Hollywood star scaling the highest building to the admiration and applause of the city and the dead Emirate woman floating in the marina, to the shock and shame of those same people who suddenly want nothing to do with the reality of the city they temporarily call home.

Those enduring powerful images are never far from the eye of the reader and like Let The Great World Spin so many hopes and fears hang in the balance of both. The image is of utmost importance in the hall of mirrors that is O'Connell's Dubai and is in some ways more important thing in the visual and material based culture highlighted by the novel.

The ties to The Great Gatsby in my mind were so strong that I involuntarily had Beyonce's song for the soundtrack in my head the whole time I was reading the book, as well as the quote from the novel “They were careless people... – they smashed up things and creatures and then retreated back into their money or their vast carelessness, or whatever it was that kept them together, and let other people clean up the mess they had made.” While Dubai is a place of great promise for characters looking to make a living to support their families, like Gete and Tahir, it is a playground for the European people who move there for a number of years for "the good life" but can return home any time, like Siobhan or Trevor.

This darkly glittering book about people from around the world brought together by a mirage of hope is compelling and addictive. I enjoyed the strong, alluring and practical Lydia and the gentle, kind Joan (and the perfect Irish mammy typo in every text: "Hisses, Mam x" really made me laugh) but my favourite characters were Aasim and his sister Hiyam. I would have read an entire novel just about them and their controlled lives at home versus their relative, glamourous seeming freedom when they travel abroad and I was disappointed not to get more of their story towards the end of the novel, and was left wondering about them and wanted more, which was my only complaint about this title. Of course, you can put two and two together and figure it all out, and maybe this is the best ending as we don't always get closure about these mysteries within families in life, but it was sad to have Hiyam tie the book together in many ways but not to get her point of view - she remains out of reach, an image and a reflection of those around her, not a character we get to know.

The only people who get closure are the Irish characters who are able to make a mess and get out of it just as quickly. This decision to end the book this way, though not my first choice, is still interesting and feels correct when taken with the book as a whole, and the novel's evocative final lines - that things come and go, and this sparkling, mesmerizing city and it's promises is no different.

This is such an exciting debut from a confident, skilled writer who, if Diving for Pearls is anything to go by, has a long and successful career in front of him.

Knowing nothing about Dubai “Diving for Pearls’ by Jamie O’Connell was a real eye opener for me. The disparity between rich and poor was brilliantly portrayed, as was the crooked judicial system. I thoroughly enjoyed this book despite it being quite depressing.

Only 3 stars for me I'm afraid but this is more about the writing style rather than the quality of the book / storyline. The authors style reminded me of JG Ballard where the story is told from the perspective of many characters at once and it is a personal preference that I don't particularly enjoy that style as it is difficult to engage with the characters when there isn't a main protagonist.

Also, I felt the ending didn't actually finalise the situation of all the characters and therefore felt like the reader was left with unanswered questions.

Worth a read but not your next book love.

the setting of Diving for Pearls by Jamie O'Connell is so real - I felt like I was really in dubai! this book glitters with description and is vibrant with characters. Stylistically, the writing felt a little lacklustre but this book is sure to be a hit nonetheless. I look forward to seeing the waves it makes.

Started this and got 10% in before stopping. Stereotypical characters, sloppy writing. Not for me sorry

Thanks to NetGalley for the review copy! This book certainly opened my eyes to the underside of Dubai... very interesting.

A woman is found floating in the marina in Dubai and her death brings very different fates for different characters in a city which only benefits the wealthy. Beyond the luxury and glamour, there are dirty foundations and very different experiences for people there depending on nationality and wealth.

Some interesting characters but I did feel like I was left wanting a little more at the end!

I loved this book. I enjoyed every aspect of it. Irish authors, I don’t know what it is, but they really do tell such a good tale. A story about people and their struggles, their emotions, their every day lives, just so riveting I thought.

The book is set mainly in Dubai, although one of the less involved characters – Trevor and Siobhan’s mother, still lives at home in Ireland. All the way through there is an insidious atmosphere of oppression, from both the overbearing heat of the desert and the somewhat harsh culture of an Arab state.

All the characters are so well drawn. Quite an achievement to bring such convincing authenticity to each of the characters from around the world as the reader hears their stories through the chapters, they all seem so real.

Tahir, the Pakistani taxi driver, working to send home his earnings to keep his family back in Pakistan. He keeps his head down, he drives all day, every day, the same routes until he can finally knock off only to sleep in poor, shared accommodation with only the very basics.

Aasim, a rich young Emirati who on first meeting him at the beginning of the book seems all consumed with designer names and expensive possessions. He’s studying in Ireland where he lives with his partner but has been called back to Dubai by his family which is somewhere he would really rather not be.

There’s the irish family. Siobhan has moved to Dubai with her husband Martin and their two young boys. They moved there for a better life and Siobhan loves it. She invites her brother Trevor over for a break whilst trying to convince him of the good opportunities there are for him to make something of his life. Living with them is Gete their Ethiopian maid. Again, like Tahir she’s gone to Dubai to earn money to send back to her family in Ethiopia.

They all came here with hopes for a better life, but once here, they find it’s not so easy to leave and are fast coming to realise, as the saying goes, all that glitters is not gold.

It’s difficult to pigeon-hole this book into any kind of specific genre but perhaps you might class it as a thriller, yet I thought there was far more to it than that with a fair few morals to the tale. It certainly keeps you on the edge at times, especially towards the end.

An absolutely brilliant book, the setting of Dubai making this story into something quite unique. I would love to read more by this author.

***Just as an aside. After spending a lot of time whilst writing this review trying to find out what a native of Dubai is actually described as, because I didn't want to cause offence or put my foot in it through ignorance (Arab, Arabian?? etc to find out it's actually Emirati) I stumbled across quite a lot of discussion about Dubai. I read two separate accounts of people who live there but are ex pats and not native to the country. Their descriptions of life in Dubai identified completely with the descriptions in this book. It has all been an eye-opening and fascinating insight.

Having read the blurb for this book I was excited to read it especially having spent some time in Dubai myself.
The story concerns the death and apparent murder of young Emerati girl. Because she is from a (very) wealthy family there is a large and concerted police investigation into her death. Various people are arrested and questioned on suspicion of having something to do with her death.
And here in lies part of the problem for me. We are introduced in the early chapters to a considerable number of characters all of whom have something (remotely in some cases) to do with the situation. From about half way in the novel the pace picks up and things appear to be moving and the reader feels that they will learn what happened but the story ends abruptly without resolution and leaving several of the characters hanging. Moreover we never actually meet the character who was possibly/probably guilty for the girl's death and we only find out who was blamed in the epilogue.
None of the main characters come across as particularly likeable and some of them are extremely flawed.
For me the best part of the book were descriptions of Dubai, the lifestyle of (some of) the expats living there and the appalling social divisions that exist. The buildings, the wealth, the shopping malls, the restaurants and the nice touch of the film star climbing from the top of the Burj Khalifa were a great backdrop and well described. The few chapters set in Ireland were also fully believable.
Sadly I will go to bed tonight going through different ending scenarios for the plot because the one provided was inadequate and unsatisfying.
With thanks to Netgalley and Random House UK, Transworld Publishers for the chance to read this novel in return for an honest review.

The book started well but ended somewhere around a 2.5. I was intrigued by the introduction of the different characters and the explanations of how they were all linked to the death at the centre of the plot. The descriptions of the setting and the class divide and politics at play there were interesting. The main problem was the ending. What happened to the other people who had their lives altered? They arguably had a more interesting story but were just left in some kind of limbo. It may have been deliberate and the white people with money could just leave and get on with their lives while the others didn't have that luxury but It just felt unfinished (or finished in a hurry) and unsatisfying.

A story that jumps around a lot and takes a while to get going but once it does, it delivers. A interesting premise and a cast of characters all so very different from each other. What did happen to the woman in the marina and how are these 6 people involved? A bit of a clunky journey to find out but it was an enjoyable read.