Ten Years in the Tub

Nick Hornby, the British author who brought us High Fidelity and About a Boy, has been writing a monthly book column for The Believer (which I'd never heard of either) for about a decade. His columns are now all collected in Ten Years in the Tub, subtitled "A Decade Soaking in Good Books." It's a lovely and dangerous collection of columns reviewing books, where each column begins with a list of books purchased and books read, talking about the reader's life --- "We are never allowed to forget that some books are badly written; we should remember that sometimes they're badly read, too." --- and making suggestions and recommendations both interesting and funny. Alas, as I write this I have an even dozen physical books on the library shelf and three books being read on my Nook. As a result of reading the first sixty pages of Hornby's book, I've reserved another eight books --- eleven now that I tripped over more references while looking up that quote two sentences ago --- to the library reserves and downloaded three more. If I continue to read this book, I will do nothing for the next decade but reserve books from the library and read them. So I lob this hand grenade in your direction, dear reader, and wish you luck.