The Polysyllabic Spree

This book is a hilarious collection of Nick Hornby's essays from The Believer magazine. A finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for his music criticism, Hornby now turns his unerring gaze to books as he gives account of what he's read, along with what he's bought and may one day read.

If he occasionally implores a biographer for brevity, or abandons a literary work in favor of an Arsenal soccer match, then all is not lost. His warm and riotous writing, full of all the joy and surprise and despair that books bring him, reveals why we still read, even when there's soccer on TV, a pram in the hall, and a good band playing at our local bar.

Half of the book's proceeds come to 826NYC, and half go to the Treehouse Trust, a U.K. charity that provides an Educational Center of Excellence for children with autism. Order it here.

Discussed in this book: Dickens' retort to minimalism; edible poems; the pros and cons of Salinger; the Dewey Decimal vs. Trivial Pursuit system of organizing a library; Britons in Los Angeles (indoors & wrapped in cold flannel); the omnipresence of Stuyvesant High School; how to stop smoking and stay stopped for good; the death of pop culture; the literary equivalent of salad, mustard, and brandy; the difficulty of writing vs. the ease of invention; the exact point at which innovations stop looking like mistakes.

No. of pages: 152
Format: Trade paperback
Publisher: Believer Books
Price: $14.00
ISBN: 1-932416-24-2
Available on Amazon: Here.