Nick Hornby – 31 songs (04-061)

[gerbie]

Nick Hornby – 31 songs (04-061)

Number: 04-061
Title: 31 songs
Author: Nick Hornby
Language: English
Year: 2003
# Pages: 242 (11786)
Category: Music
ISBN: 0-141-01386-9

As a fan, one tends to buy everything by an author that has proven his qualities. Hornby imho fits the category. I loved his first two: Fever Pitch and High Fidelity. Like many other men I thought they were written about me. About a Boy and How to be Good are very good books as well. I had my doubts about this one though. Weird, given that I enjoyed everything he ever wrote and that I like reading about music as well. Yet I had it in my hands a few times before I actually bought it.

My feeling turned out to be correct. This is his worst book. That doesn’t say a lot for someone who reaches a very high standard all the time. It doesn’t mean it is not worth reading either. Yet I got bored after a while. He does write some interesting articles about some artists and I am curious about some of the unknown ones. But in the end he does exactly what he doesn’t want to do: talk about memories that belong to a certain tune. This certainly is interesting, yet on the other hand only for a limited amount of time. Read this one if you’re a fan or if you’re 17 and think that music is the single most important thing in the world. Read it on the toilet, just a bit at the time.

Comments

[shebear.livejournal.com]

I read that one early in the year (it's called Songbook here in the States). I liked some of the essays, particularly the ones that involved his son, but I found it quite uneven as well. I have his latest, The Polysyllabic Spree, here waiting to be read. I promised myself I wouldn't start until January. Anyway, it's a chronicle of his reading experiences in a year and I'm hoping it's as good as it has the potential to be.

[gerbie.livejournal.com]

I didn't know that one was out even. When checking it on Amazon, I already found the next one coming out next spring as well. I must catch up again.