Can Hornby Escape The Word Glib? (How to be good - Nick Hornby)

Member Name: KingHerrod

Product:	How to be good - Nick Hornby
Date:	09/06/02 (1707 review reads)
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I have previously found Nick Hornby to be a hit and miss author. I enjoyed Fever Pitch; I thought I enjoyed High Fidelity, until I re-read it and the book's innate shallowness shone through, if shallowness can shine? I found About a Boy to be even more shallow, crammed full of metaphors and clichés that were supposed to be funny, but left me feeling that here was a book that was glib. However, all three were well written and supremely easy to read.

Why then did I read How to be Good? I suppose its Booker long list nomination and some favourable reviews in newspapers that I respect, persuaded me and after all in all of Hornby's previous books, there has been that huge spark of potential present.

How to be Good focuses on the dilemma of the privileged Western World. We do not struggle to feed or dress ourselves, we seem to fill our needs with commercialism and well there seems to be a void. To be honest, commercialism has not bought about universal happiness. The theme is similar to Fight Club, but dealt with in a very different way, and perhaps to How to be Good's credit an altogether more subtle way. Obviously this void is not present in the third world or even the deprived in our own country, but we are talking about the privileged people in the western world here.

David Carr is the "angriest man in Holloway". A real cynic and negative man, everything just seems to piss him off, well everything that is not really that important. His wife and the first person voice of the novel, Katie, is a Doctor, a kind GP and fed up with her cynic husband and to some extent her two children, Tom and Molly. Katie suffers from an empty hole in her spirit, get up go to work, come home to an angry and bitter man, go to sleep and so on. In true suburban London style, both David and Katie are liberal Londoners, liberal of the political persuasion. Intellectual, fair minded, free thinking......but are they really good?
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br><br>Into their life arrives DJ GoodNews, a faith healer who cures David's bad back and their daughter's eczema, but he brings more than this to the Carr family. David has a personality change, he becomes a do-gooder - a do-gooder in the practical sense, why do we need all these consumer products when some people are so deprived? Why can't we do more to help the homeless? Why shouldn't people realise how lucky they really are? But is this good?

So there we are, the book is clearly talking about important principles in our contemporary world, it is an attack on our consumer values that we hold so dear, the I must have the latest Prada bag or Dior make up. I must have satellite TV, a DVD player an MP3 and 6 computers. The question the book asks is why? Wouldn't some of this excess wealth be better channelled elsewhere? Why can't one person say, sod this it is the government's fault, what can one person do, I am going to set an example? Well David along with DJ GoodNews embarks on a two man crusade to save people from their own greed and comfortableness and much to Katie's chagrin she would rather have her angry, cynical but funny husband back. Is David good and Katie bad? Katie is a doctor after all, doesn't that make her good by definition?

Hornby points to the demise of religion for this crisis in people's definition of good, nobody goes to Church and most people have realised that religion does not really hold the answers, there is guidance, but how much of it is relevant to today?

So far so good, a novel about how can people be good in the face of so much embarrassment and prejudice. You decide to shun consumerism and see what your friends make of you, especially if you work in the City. Moreover, it examines what is our definition of good, how far does an individual need to go to be good and how practical is this idealistic standpoint? But Hornby still falls down in places.
He seems to think that you can only amuse if you can fit as many metaphors on the page as possible, amusing metaphors at that. Some hit the mark, but ultimately some of the metaphors seem forced and detract from the flow of the book. Furthermore, Hornby fails to develop some of his excellent social themes, he builds them up to the point when he can really discuss serious issues and then just winds them up, just like that. In particular in this book, he just cuts off the discussion of the homeless problem, without really examining it in depth. So in the end the feeling of unfulfilled potential is still prevalent in How to be Good as it was in About a Boy, but this time Hornby saves himself with a wonderfully thoughtful ending where he pulls all the ideas together in a rather perceptive conclusion.

The writing is superb, (when you remove the continual and unnecessary use of metaphors) Hornby is a master of easy flowing prose that draws you into the narrative and the characters, some of the exchanges with the children were priceless, capturing that wonderful childhood innocence and intelligence. Furthermore, there are times when How to be Good makes you laugh, there is no doubting that Hornby is one of those observant comic writers that can capture perfectly aspects of our society that when reduced down to their most basic level are in fact rather amusing.

How to be Good is far more reflective and philosophical than anything Hornby has written before.

""If you start examining your prejudices carefully there will soon be nothing left of you.""

""But just because a lot of people don't have a problem with something, it doesn't mean that they are right, does it? I mean a lot of people used to think that Slavery was OK, but you know. They were wrong, weren't they?""

In the end you have applaud Hornby for tackling such a difficult subject in such an easy going and easy
to read way. He has put some important ideas into the mainstream and hopefully he will have made some greedy pointless people examine their own lives and cut back on what they perceive that they need.

How to be Good is thoughtful, amusing in places, observant, perceptive, full of ideas and a very well written easy read. If Hornby had managed to avoid his clichés, metaphors and glibness then this would have been a book that may have reached classic status, as it is, it is just a good thoughtful novel, that rises just above the average.

Published by Penguin.

ISBN 0-140-28701-9.

244 pages long.

Priced £6.99, but still currently available for half price plus postage and packaging from http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/tg/feature/-/2 96329/ref=mk_p3_h_1_4/202-325627 9-9823833, which for £3.49 you cannot go far wrong.

Further details of all penguin books are available from www.penguin.com.

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