This is a compendium of a year's worth of Hornby's columns about books bought and/or read in The Believer magazine. The tone is colloquial like whoa, a bit skittish. Hornby, who's penned About A Boy and A Long Way Down, among other novels, is (unlike much of what he attempts to read) high readable himself. This little jam of a book flies over 140 pages.

Yes, it is fun to commiserate with a for-real writer who laments things like being given book recommendation (or, worse, being gifted books outright):

“Usually, of course, I treat personal book recommendations with the suspicion they deserve. I’ve got enough to read as it is, so my first reaction when someone tells me to read something is to find a way to doubt their credentials, or to try to dredge up some conflicting view from my memory. (Just as stone always blunts scissors, a lukewarm “Oh, it was OK,” always beats a “You have to read this.” It’s less work that way.)”

The title comes from the moniker he's given an imaginary (or are they?) squad of Believer mag honchos who issue edicts to him as to how he will write his column. (One stipulation: Abandon any book that's not going well, and DO NOT mention it by name.) He imagines them in flowing robes, 12 of them (6 of each gender of course); of course this is meant to drum up the Polyphonic Spree, those be-robed indie choir rockers, as Hornby (also author of Songbook and High Fidelity; need I say more?) is some kind of music snob.

This book (I was -- gasp -- gifted it!) is hardly necessary but sometimes insightful and often amusing. Poignant and yet funny are his thoughts on books about autism; his own son has the condition. He gushes over Dickens and Vonnegut and more, interspersing some poems and excerpts he loves amidst his own columns/chapters.

Here's Hornby on novels, their epic and lengthy qualities:

“But there comes a point in the writing process when a novelist—any novelist, even a great one—has to accept that what he is doing is keeping one end of a book away from the other, filling up pages, in the hope that these pages will move, provoke, and entertain the reader.”

And on how one can Wiki his way to impressing others:

“A good chunk of coming across as educated, after all, is just a matter of knowing who wrote what: someone mentions Patrick Hamilton, and you nod sagely and say, Hangover Square, and that’s usually enough. … ‘the truly cultured are capable of owning thousands of unread books without losing their composure or their desire for more.’”

I honestly feel better on the other side of thumbing through this read. That's what he intended, and that's what matters.

Just picked this up after purchasing years ago & putting it on the shelf. Perfect for a book about buying and not reading books. He’s witty and charming in his detail of read and purchased but unread books. Wrote down some to check out. Was pleased to hear thoughts on books I have read. Quick read. Interesting for fans of Hornby.

I had never read anything by Nick Hornby before picking up his slim volume of collected articles from Believer magazine, enticingly titled The Polysyllabic Spree. I’ve never even seen the movies based on his work, and I was employed by a video rental store for five years. After reading this, I’m a little sad that I haven’t given him a chance before this; Hornby is a highly accessible and entertaining writer, even when doing something as simple as keeping a monthly record of his reading habits.

It’s fortunate for Hornby that he is so accessible, as this is a complaint he touches on with some frequency in regards to other writers and critics. He is a “reader of the masses,” the kind of guy that would like to eliminate all of the pretentious nonsense that turns the average person away from reading. I like him for this, since most professional critics and reviewers try so hard to present themselves as the arbiters of good taste, who read in a vacuum and pass their judgment from on high.

Basically, this book was an entertaining little compilation of reviews tinged with autobiography and social commentary. There were some reviews that were rather pointless, as they didn’t receive enough space to convey much, but there were others that made me throw the book aside and scramble for a bit of paper to scrawl titles for future reference. His identification of himself by the books he has read/bought has to hit home with anyone that loves to read, and the fact that he is able to integrate his reading life into his real life makes his writing very enjoyable, even when his "Polysyllabic Spree*" joke starts to wear a little thin.

I think I knew that Hornby was going to be my kind of guy after the first few articles. You see, each entry is preceded by a list of the books he has purchased and the books read each month, and these lists almost never sync up. It is obvious very early on that he has been accumulating a decently sized collection of books that will probably never be read, and I’m not ashamed to admit that I am in the process of doing the same thing.

(*The Polysyllabic Spree is the name Hornby has given the folks that run Believer magazine, in reference to that weird band Polyphonic Spree that had way too many members that all looked like rejects from Jonestown. You'll have to read the book to understand why this is both funny and a bit irritating).

I spend so much time bemoaning the fact that I 1. have no time read and 2. I spend way too much money on books I don't have time to read. Why not buy a book about a successful author who has the same problem?

A book about the joys of buying books and reading books - what more could one ask for? Hornby is an accomplished writer and brings a light touch to proceedings here, which are his collected monthly columns tracking his book-buying and book-reading habits. (Spoiler alert: he is not always aligned!) It's fun to spot similar habits, like over-buying books, or reading more recent purchases first. My only disappointment was that I wasn't inspired (as I hoped I might be) to go seek out anything he read or bought. But this is only volume one of three, so it is early days yet.

According to "The Polysyllabic Spree", Nick hates Amazon reviewers, which one can only assume extends to their slightly cleverer Goodreads relations. So, hey Nick, screw you too. I like this book. It was good. Books about books. Yay. Hope that meets your expectations.

Hab es innerhalb eines Nachmittags bei meinen Eltern auf dem Sofa durchgelesen mit dem Ergebnis, dass ich Nick Hornby irgendwie nicht mehr leiden kann. War auch gar nicht so spannend, was er so gelesen hat, konnte mit seiner Lektüreauswahl und den Begründungen für seine Werturteile über die Werke nichts anfangen. Anhand der durchschnittlichen Bewertung hier sehe ich aber, dass andere Leute dieses Buch, was auf einer Auswahl seiner Kolumnen für den Believer besteht, mochten, kann man vermutlich einfach selbst versuchen, es sind ja auch nur 150 Seiten.

This was one of the most enjoyable reading experiences I've ever had.

Nick Hornby writes so accessibly, and brings up so many sentiments about reading that are true but not often said, in such a funny way, that it was just a complete joy from start to finish.

I felt quite bereft when I had finished, and so
am off to the library today to pick up the sequel.

Nick Hornby gets me. This was so refreshing. Will start the next collection tomorrow!

Tuesday night found me at a Shell station on the outskirts of Nashville, Tennessee. I was filling up my tank before heading back to my hotel to curl up in a warm bed and crash. As I shivered in my too light for the 52° weather dress and sandals (it had been 30 degrees warmer when I started the day in Montgomery, Al), I yawned to remind myself of how completely beat I was and then immediately locked my keys in the car.

As I sank onto a gas station bench to wait for AAA (who were delayed due to some sort of accident which had turned a major interstate into a parking lot), I felt quite sorry for myself. Then I reached into my purse and pulled out The Polysyllabic Spree. 35 minutes later when the AAA guy arrived to rescue me, I was grinning ear to ear and marking my place in my book in markedly better spirits than I had been in before I had dived into it.

The Polysllabic Spree is a collection of essays that Nick Hornby wrote earlier this decade for The Beliver. I was completely entertained as Mr. Hornby related the details of his book reading and book buying habits for the each month. I loved that he got completely the joy of acquiring books, even when you have books everywhere and could probably never read them all if you bolted the front door and just chained yourself to the shelf. His reading tastes are quite eclectic and his writing in this is like that in his novels - breezy and fun.

The only complaint I have about the book is that due to The Believer's desire to be snark-free, books that Mr. Hornby did not care for are just referred to as abandoned literary novel, etc. I would have appreciated a warning! Quite a few of his positive reviews made me want to pick up that book right that minute and see if I loved it as well.

He spoke of a Biography of Richard Yates so glowingly that I wanted to read a book by Mr. Yates (Just the knowledge that Larry David dated his daughter, the model for Elaine in Seinfeld, was enough to pique my curiousity. The real Alton Benes, this I've got to see).

Coincidentally, I had a copy of Revolutionary Road tucked in my suitcase and so leapt in (to the book, not the suitcase). I have several more on the list from Mr. Hornby that have moved up to the top of my ever changing next to read list.

I would only change the lack of negative reviews. No need to be nasty, but it would have been nice to get a few "yikes, avoid this one!" warnings.

All in all, an entertaining book by a man who understands that "Books are, let's face it, better than everything else." Highly recommended for bibliophiles who don't just like books, but love them.

This collection of Hornby’s essays from the magazine The Believer, was beyond delightful. He writes about what books he bought each month and which ones he read. In anyone else’s hands that concept could be as dull as dirt, but Hornby makes you feel like you’ve just asked your friend, “So what have you been reading lately?”

He read a wide range of subjects in fiction, nonfiction, classics, etc. so there’s something for everyone. The funny thing was, it really wasn’t about the books themselves, it’s more about his personal reading experience. You can love his columns without ever picking up one of the books he mentions (though I evitably will).

It’s his humor and cheek that made this book so great. The way he describes reading is spot on and I couldn’t help laughing as I recognized myself in so many of his observations. Here are a few great ones…

“I don't reread books often; I'm too conscious of both my ignorance and my mortality.”

“When reading is going well, one book leads to another and to another, a paper trail of theme and meaning; and how, when it's going badly, when books don't stick or take, when your mood and the mood of the book are fighting like cats, you'd rather do anything but attempt the next paragraph or to reread the last one for the tenth time.”

“What you must do is work unceasingly, day and night, read constantly, study, exercise willpower... Every hour is precious.”

Skimming through this book again recently I had to laugh at (and appreciate) Hornby's summary of Random Family: Love, Drugs, Trouble, and Coming of Age in the Bronx.

Random Family is about two women, Coco and Jessica; LeBlanc's story, which took her ten years to write and research, begins when they're in their mid-teens, and follows them through the next couple of decades. Despite the simplicity of the setup, it's not always an easy narrative to follow. If LeBlanc were a novelist, you'd have to observe that she's screwed up by overpopulating her book, but Coco and Jessica and the Bronx don't give her an awful lot of choice, because Random Family is partly about overpopulation. Coco and Jessica have so many babies, by so many fathers, and their children have so many half-siblings, that at times it's impossible to keep their names straight. By the time the two women are in their early thirties, they have given birth to Mercedes, Nikki, Nautica, Pearl, LaMonte, Serena, Brittany, Stephany, Michael, and Matthew, by Cesar, Torres, Puma (or maybe Victor), Willy (or maybe Puma), Kodak, Wishman, and Frankie. This is a book awash with sperm (Jessica even manages to conceive twins while in prison, after an affair with a guard), and at one stage I was wondering whether it was medically possible for a man to become pregnant through reading it. I think I'm probably too old.

The combination of LeBlanc's scrupulous attention to quotidian detail and her absolute refusal to judge is weirdly reminiscent of Peter Guralnick's approach to Elvis in his monumental two-volume biography. Those of you who read the Elvis books will know that though Presley's baffling, infuriating last decade gave Guralnick plenty of opportunity to leap in and tell you what he thinks, he never once does so. LeBlanc's stern neutrality is generous and important: she hectors nobody, and the space she leaves us allows us to think properly, to recognize for ourselves all the millions of complications that shape these lives.