Hateful stereotypes of the British as well as East Europeans - Rated 
I'm glad to see that some reviewers here have commented on the lazy stereotyped view of East Europeans in this woeful book. But it is also full of hateful one-dimensional stereotypes in its British characters too - we are not really all foul-mouthed, rude, obese brutes. Tremain takes a sentimental view of the world, where all the British do is wrong and shallow while East Europeans are poor victims with big souls. Both equally stereotypes and both equally untrue to reality. I've enjoyed the couple of other novels of hers I've read but this is a terrible, terrible book.
The road home - Rated 
Rose Tremain is an excellent writer who holds your attention from the very beginning of the book.
This is the story of a Polish man who come to England in the hope of earning some money. It highlights the great hardships he has to endure and the kindness of some people willing to help him. He has lost his wife in Poland and his daughter is looked after by his mother.He manages to survive by sheer dogged determination and learns to become a chef, at first doing the washing up in a restaurant, but keeping his eyes open and learning from the chef. He finally returns to Poland and opens his restaurant. A very good read!
Highly Offensive - Rated
As an Estern European, I found this book highly offensive. The author went in the fields of Norfolk to do her research on immigrants (I wonder how offended those people were, being regarded as perhaps "anthropological material"), but never traveled to Eastern Europe to see for herself that kids don't play with goats in their lunch breaks (they don't have any to start with) and don't eat goats' meat with hard boiled eggs.
It's a shame.
Good at first but then dissapointing. - Rated
The book drew me in at first with some interesting characters, but then I quickly got tired of the crude stereotypes of immigrants and foreigners. I don't consider myself a stiff, politically correct person and I think "Little Britain" is hysterical. However don't think this author intended for her book to be so comical and it got embarrassing to read halfway through.
Liked but did not love - Rated 
After losing his job and his wife, Lev leaves his little daughter with his mother and sets off for London to find work and support his family. By a lucky chance, he meets a woman on the bus who helps him find a job after a brief period of homelessness. Working in the kitchen of an elite restaurant, Lev learns that he loves to cook and carefully observes the chef and other workers to glean their skills. Through a relationship with his co-worker and a path to success in his new career, Lev begins to understand the wider world while growing to appreciate and love his home even more.
I felt a little uncertain about this book while I was reading it and I still do now. I'm not quite sure how to review it because it's one of those books that I liked but didn't really like that much. The best part, clearly, was Lev's sense of accomplishment and his ambition once he realized what he really wanted out of his life. I love to read about ambitious, goal-oriented, determined people. Obviously life gets in the way sometimes, but I can identify with them the best. Unfortunately, however, Lev also seems to have a somewhat ignorant or cruel streak towards women. He does not want a relationship after his wife, so he rebuffs one woman, but then he finds another, decides he's in love with her, and ends up treating her quite badly when things don't end the way he expects. The girl is partly at fault for leading him on, but all of his relationships with women bothered me.
I did like the entire theme of home running through this novel. Even when Lev makes a groove for himself in London, he still misses the people and the place that is his home. Eventually he realizes that it's the people and not the place itself, but that doesn't stop him from trying to do his best for his home country and making a difference for his family. The title is really well chosen; even though Lev starts out leaving home, the entire novel is at the core about his journey returning and how he's going to get there as a more successful man than when he left.
I'm still a little on the fence about whether to recommend this book or not. It is one of those difficult reads that falls i
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