Housekeeping vs. the Dirt

In his latest collection of essays, critic and author Nick Hornby continues the feverish survey of his swollen bookshelves, offering funny, intelligent, and unblinkered accounts of the stuff he’s been reading. Ranging far and wide from the middlebrow, Hornby’s dispatches from his nightstand serve as invaluable guides to contemporary letters, with revelations on the intellectual scene and English football in equal measure. Printed monthly in the Believer, Hornby’s book reviews are suffused with wit, ire, and loving insight, and his choices often strike into the deeper, odder reaches of the literary world. He is as adamant about the experience of reading a book as he is about the importance of the book itself, and can be trusted to point out which books are ridiculously unfunny, which books can be read incognito for their naughtiness, and, most urgently, which books can bring themselves “all the way through the long march to your soul.”

“[His columns are] as rich and varied as the world of literature itself, with Hornby perfectly cast as both tour guide and host... insatiable bibliophiles will devour [them] with delight.”
—San Francisco Chronicle