No more excuses, blocked novelists: A shrink convinced nervous London lawyer Joseph O'Neill to follow his novel-writing dream. Ten years on, he took the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction.

My writing teacher says we should all go to the shrink to get "un-blocked." Maybe she's on to something: Joseph O'Neill, hottie Netherland author, has one. Page Six reports that the former London barrister was nervous about his novel-writing dream until his shrink told him to get on with it already and move to the States to write. Result: "One of the most remarkable post-colonial books I have ever read."-the New Yorker. [Page Six]

Joseph O'Neill's much-talked-about new novel is called Netherland and is partially about the game of cricket. It's been getting great reviews, except in England and the L.A. Times! (Fierce literary critic James Wood called it "one of the most remarkable post-colonial books I have ever read," in the New Yorker.) However, we found the following passage—about a trip on the London Eye—a trifle confusing. Perhaps you can help make heads or tails of it: