High Fidelity by Nick Hornby Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of High Fidelity
Book Review: 3 Stars for good writing, nil for the self-indulgence.
Summary: 3 Stars
This book got off to a very promising start for me, a writer with a good pen. I was starting to enjoy it until the more reflective elements of the book started to dominate. Hornby really labours the point and sometimes I felt myself shouting at the book. I was really getting fed up with his discourses on the protagonist's disastrous relationships. The book started to be self-absorbed in the exploration of the self-v-one's personal demons. Of course there are many who would say that is the entire point of the book: self-absorption leads to nowhere.Book Review: A "Guy" Book
Summary: 5 Stars
It was recommended as a "guy" book. It really is. I read it cover to cover, then re-read it, then loaned it to my brother to read.Book Review: A *real* can't-put-it-down book!
Summary: 5 Stars
My fast-paced, work-filled, family-filled life rarely leaves me two consecutive minutes in which I can enjoy one of those "can't-put-'em-down" books. So, I end up wading through even the most fast-paced books at a snail's speed. Not High Fidelity. I started and just couldn't stop. I took a sick day, sent the kids off with their dad, and finished it off in a day. I laughed out loud, and called my girlfriends to share the jokes. This is the "if-you-can-only-read-one-book-this-year" book!Book Review: A Close-Reading of the Self, Sparkling With Wit
Summary: 5 Stars
Nick Hornby's HIGH FIDELITY opens with a list that most teenage males and men have made variations of in their own lives: their five most memorable break-ups. Before we even know where this list is going to lead, we know protagonist Rob Fleming is going to be a guy after many of our hearts. He is the kind of guy that pays extremely close attention to his relationships with women, is always looking for that "perfect" girlfriend (in the sense of perfect for him), and if pressed just a bit, could readily produce the names of every girl that ever deigned to kiss him romantically on the lips. Not that this is a good thing, but it's just something we can do, kind of like being able to rattle off the last ten NCAA basketball champions. Self-obsessed? Sure. Recognizable? Like the sun in the sky.Rob is a 35-year-old North London record shop owner who never recovered from the toughest of those five break-ups--the one that stunned him right out of college. He knows his chosen musical genres obsessively, but no longer quite as obsessively as his employees, the overbearing Barry and timid Dick. The shop and his music, however, seem to make up Rob's whole world, and he is not comfortable outside them. Nor is he happy with himself outside of a monogamous relationship. So why (consciously or not) does he always sabotage them? Following Rob as he seeks the answer to this question can be hilarious and sad and rejuvenating.
Hornby's prose is consistently keen of wit and often raucously funny. Because there's just so much literature out there I want to experience, I almost never re-read books. I read HIGH FIDELITY twice in six weeks--Nick Hornby taught me how silly I was.
Book Review: A Hilarious and Realistic View on Relationships
Summary: 5 Stars
High Fidelity by Nick Hornby, is not just another sappy book about relationships gone bad, but a refreshingly realistic account of relationships through the eyes of man. Hornby's exquisite and hilarious style of writing keeps the pages turning and the reader laughing and nodding as they relate to, and gain insight on, different aspects of love and life.Nick Hornby does a spectacular job at defining each character and bringing them to life. Rob Fleming seems to jump off the pages and speaks of his love life, or lack of at times, in such vivid detail and emotion, it's as if Rob himself is sitting in your living room recounting the confused drama that is his life.
High Fidelity is a definite must read for all who have been in relationships, or are thinking of beginning one. This novel will give you some understanding of the male point-of-view as well as the hardships, confusion, and the sometimes backwards reality that seems to get mixed up in the stereotypical notion of love. All of which is portrayed through the hilarious and blunt writing style of one of my "top five favorite" authors, Nick Hornby.