High Fidelity: A Novel [Paperback]

From the bestselling author of Funny Girl, About a Boy, and A Long Way Down, a wise and hilarious novel about love, heartbreak, and rock and roll.

Rob is a pop music junkie who runs his own semi-failing record store. His girlfriend, Laura, has just left him for the guy upstairs, and Rob is both miserable and relieved. After all, could he have spent his life with someone who has a bad record collection? Rob seeks refuge in the company of the offbeat clerks at his store, who endlessly review their top five films; top five Elvis Costello songs; top five episodes of Cheers. 

Rob tries dating a singer, but maybe it’s just that he’s always wanted to sleep with someone who has a record contract. Then he sees Laura again. And Rob begins to think that life with kids, marriage, barbecues, and soft rock CDs might not be so bad.  As funny, compulsive and contemporary a first novel as you could wish for. —GQ

One of the top ten books of the year. —Entertainment Weekly

It is rare that a book so hilarious is also so sharp about sex and manliness, memory and music. —The New Yorker

Mr. Hornby captures the loneliness and childishness of adult life with such precision and wit that you'll find yourself nodding and smiling.High Fidelityfills you with the same sensation that you get from hearing a debut record album that has more charm and verve and depth than anything you can recall. —The New York Times Book Review

Hornby's seamless prose and offhand humor make for one hilarious set piece after another, as suffering, self-centered Rob ruminates on women, sex, andAbbey Road. But then he's forced to consider loneliness, fitting-in, death, and failure—andthatis what lingers. —Spin

Keep this book away from your girlfriend—it contains too many of your secrets to let it fall into the wrong hands. &l³.