From Publishers Weekly
British journalist Hornby has fashioned a disarming, rueful and sometimes quite funny first novel that is not quite as hip as it wishes to be. The book dramatizes the romantic struggle of Rob Fleming, owner of a vintage record store in London. After his girlfriend, Laura, leaves him for another man, he realizes that he pines not for sexual ecstasy (epitomized by a "bonkus mirabilis" in his past) but for the monogamy this cynic has come to think of as a crime. He takes comfort in the company of the clerks at the store, whose bantering compilations of top-five lists (e.g., top five Elvis Costello songs; top-five films) typify the novel's ingratiating saturation in pop culture. Sometimes this can pall: readers may find that Rob's ruminations about listening to the Smiths and the Lemonheads?pop music helps him fall in love, he tells us?are more interesting than his list of five favorite episodes of Cheers. Rob takes comfort as well in the company of a touring singer, Marie La Salle, who is unpretentious and "pretty in that nearly cross-eyed American way"?but life becomes more complicated when he encounters Laura again. Hornby has earned his own place on the London bestseller lists, and this on-the-edge tale of musical addiction just may climb the charts here. First serial to Esquire.

One of Hornby's best, I think - if not the best. It made me really appreciate how good the movie is - it just portrays the book so perfectly.
Reserved for Everybook VBB.

Posted today to Potok-fan.

Arrived today - thank you! :)

I lost this on my shelves (now *there*'s a sign that I have too many books), but was inspired to dig through to find it a month or two back when I finally watched the movie version of this.

Now I'm flying to California for a week, and am taking this along. I also have some required reading with me, so might or might not get to this on this trip... but if I *do*, I will probably wild-release it there.

UPDATE: Didn't get read on this trip (although Mr P looked longingly at it). Back to the TBR shelf for now.

Journal post from halfway through. I'm loving this. I can hear the movie actors' voices (in a good way) (especially Jack Black) and am also enjoying coming across scenes which didn't make it into the movie, or noticing differences, such as words moved from one character's mouth to another.

The funniest is the description of Marie LaSalle, which had to be changed once Lisa Bonet was cast. She's described in the book like Susan Dey, so they keep it, with one crucial addition, which must have had the writers falling about laughing - deadpanned by Dick in the film, it's She's kind of Sheryl Crow-ish crossed with a post-Partridge Family pre-L.A. Law Susan Dey kind of thing, but, you know, uh, black.

Just read aloud to Mr P some of Rob's interior monologue pre-sex, which had us both guffawing. :)

Never got around to journalling once I'd finished, but I thoroughly enjoyed this. It was perhaps all the better for not worrying about what was going to happen. Having seen the film, I knew already. And rather than ruining it for me, it just let me savor the telling without rushing (or holding back in fear when things start to go pear-shaped).

Now I have to decide what to do with the book. Very tempting to stick it in PC for a while. But that's not very BC of me. Hmmm....

WILD RELEASE NOTES:

For the book buffet at Kesäpäivät - the All-Finland annual BookCrossing meeting

I took this at the Finnish sunmmer meeting in Nauvo.

I don't think I have seen the movie based on this novel, so it was all new to me! :-) I knew that the story is music related, though.

I'm not much of a chick lit reader, but in spite of that, or perhaps because of that, I found it hilarious that Rob was easily as neurotic and lost as any average chick lit heroine.

I must confess that first I thought that Marie LaSalle was a real musician, and I even Googled her. Then she became a part of the plot, and I understood that she must be fictional. ;-)

Jätän kirjan jonnekin suunnilleen iltakuuden ja -seitsemän välillä, ehkä tuohon Kumpare-kauppakeskukseen... :)