My Favorite Year: A Collection of Football Writing by nick hornby

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

To be fair, I don't suppose I'm the intended audience for this book. I like football, I take great pleasure in a good match, but I'm not what you'd call a fan.
I enjoyed some of the stories in this collection, I liked the nostalgic flavour, but it all got quite repetitive after a while, and I honestly couldn't care less about the lists of names and matches and scores of the seasons covered.

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Derl88

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

A quick read - several short autobiographical tales by male authors/journalists (mainly) focussing on their experiences as a football supporter. There's a decent range of teams covered - from international to non-league - and stories from the 1960s to the 1990s. There is a quirky added pleasure due to the book having written in 1993.. Chelsea before they were so good, Leeds before they were so crap.

However, the problem is that there isn't much breadth in the style. It's blokes talking about football in a rose-tinted nostalgic and occasionally humourous way, with the sense most of the reminiscing is personal to thise concerned. Additionally, most chapters were a bit similar, having been written separately. There's only so many ways you can say "When I was young I wasn't allowed to stay up for late games, my Dad told me the score at breakfast.." or "I collected football memorabilia when I was young".

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Ihatesourkraut

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

Take my whole life too...
Partiamo dal presupposto che io adoro Hornby come autore.
A settembre, al ritorno dalle vacanze estive, mi sono trovato in libreria e ho acquistato ad occhi chiusi questo libro pensando fosse un romanzo simile a "Febbre a 90" dello stesso autore.
Oggi è Dicembre e ci sono voluti 3 mesi per "finire" questo libro. Perchè?
Perchè è una raccolta di 12 racconti o più sul calcio. Tutti quanti sul calcio inglese. Tutti quanti sulle serie minori. Ripetitivi e tedianti.
Dov'è Nick Hornby? In un racconto di 12 pagine (pessimo tra l'altro)
SOFFERENZA!
"Illusioni di grandeur" di Olly Wicken e "L'anno d'oro" di Chris Pierson sono gli unici due racconti simpatici che raggiungono la mediocrità..

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lights_blacK

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

A great compilation brought together by Mr Fever Pitch to explain to readers why football isn't just two groups of people fighting in the stands and streets.

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HaiAlwaysHungry

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

A reasonable collection of 'New' (ie, highly personal) football journalism, each story the review, more or less, of one year in the life of that supporter and his team. Some of the contributions were interesting, though none really stood out as prime examples of the craft.

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Blockpoker

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

April 17,2025

This is a great read for anyone who loves football. Several well-known writers discuss their favourite teams' most memorable football seasons. Nick Hornby's hilarious story about Cambridge United's losing streak is great, but my favourite has to be Roddy Doyle's account of his "heroic" trip to the toilet that led to Ireland scoring a vital goal against England. The one about Watford is amazing too!

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