Disappointing book

I was a book for my birthday (well a few but I'm just telling you about this
one for now :-)) called Small Island

It had won the orange prize for fiction so I was quite excited about reading
it. Well I have to say I was quite disappointed by it. Its based in 1948 but
much of the story is told in retrospect and it jumps between the characters
like a 3rd person observing that persons life. A lot of the book is about
Jamaican immigrants just after the war, their view of England before they
came, what they experienced when they came and the English's views towards
them.
There is quite a lot of character development for 3/4 of the book but then
it's almost like they thought well I'd better finish it and the end is very
predictable and quite flat really.

Would love to find out if anyone else has read it and what they thought about it.