What a delightful surprise. For some reason, I assumed Housekeeping vs The Dirt contained the last of Nick Hornby's beloved columns for the Believer. So you can imagine how pleased I was to discover that he had continued writing for the literary magazine for two more years (albeit with a little break), and thus another collection had been produced.

What I love about Nick Hornby's columns is that ultimately, he is one of us. Book lover, geek, afficionado. However you want to think of it. He is someone who gets excited about the prospect of going hunting for books, who buys far more than he ever plans to read, someone who can't help himself...just like us. It is this, along with his hilariously witty writing, that makes his columns so readable.

Shakespeare Wrote for Money is a highly enjoyable return to Hornby's wit and honesty, and wonderfully random detours into complete nonsense. Standout moments in this book are Hornby's discovery of young adult fiction, abandoning a month of reading to watch and rant about the World Cup, discovering how ants find their way home.

However, I did not find this collection quite as engaging as Hornby's previous work for the Believer. I did not find as many side-splitting laughs as before, and a lot of the books reviewed did not interest me as much. But that is personal preference of course, and I did pick up several recommendations from this collection, some of which I was already thinking of reading:

Skellig - David Almond
The Accidental - Ali Smith
Field Notes from a Catastrophe - Elizabeth Kolbert
On Chesil Beach - Ian McEwan
Poppy Shakespeare - Clare Allan
The Road - Cormac McCarthy
American Born Chinese - Gene Luen Yang
Tom's Midnight Garden - Philippa Pearce
The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao - Junot Diaz

Definitely worth a read, though I recommend the other two collections even more! Nick Hornby, the worst bad bloggers of all! We'll miss your columns.

I have enjoyed several novels by Nick Hornby, so when I saw this book, I grabbed it. More than just book reviews, it contains Hornby’s musings on literature, pop culture, current events, publishing politics, sports and the human condition. Throughout, his dry sense of humor is apparent. I actually laughed out loud a couple of times and had to explain to my husband that I was laughing about a British novelist’s book review column. ( )

The last in his collection of article written for The Believer, Shakespeare Wrote for Money is just as funny as the first two. The dates on the articles are from August 2006 to September 2008, and include a wide range of books read from YA titles to a biography of Shakespeare.

I love getting the perspective of someone that's intelligent and interesting and humorous and feels like a real reader telling a friend what they liked or didn't like about the books they've read lately. That's the main reason these books appeal to me. Even when I'm not all that interested in the books he's talking about, I enjoy reading about his experiences as a reader instead of reading a more objective, professional review that tells me lots about a book but little about someone's experience reading it. ( )

I should preface this review by admitting that I am totally in love with Nick Hornby. I have never met the man, or even seen him in a picture (unless the stylized guy on the covers of the three collections of The Believer essays is him) but I have a raging crush on him anyway and it's all because of books like this one.

This is the third in the collection of essays Hornby wrote for The Believer magazine, following The Polysyllabic Spree and Housekeeping Versus the Dirt. They all start off with a list of books he's bought and books he's read that month. The lists never match up, which is true for most reading addicts I know and is endearing as get out to this addict, who loves to know she is not alone. Then the essays range over the books he's read that month, sometimes touching on their connections to life and other times entertaining digressions from the world of books entirely. As per magazine policy, he only discusses books he's enjoyed but occasionally mentions, without identifying features, books he's set aside as unreadable. The essays read like a conversation you might have with Hornby while walking down a street together, easy and comfortable, smart and engaging. This is truly a wonderful book for other book lovers, and especially those of us who take some measure of enjoyment from writing about what we've read. Unfortunately, this is the last of the collections of this type as Hornby has left the magazine to spend more time with his family. A sad event for his readers although probably a happy one for his family (darn them anyway). Highly recommended. ( )

I was terribly disappointed to read that this is the last volume of Hornby's collected Believer columns we will see; he is now devoting his time to other projects. His column, about what he bought and what he read and what he didn't read, never failed to amuse me. I've got books on my shelves that I wouldn't have bought and read but for Hornby's recommendations, and some of them I've loved and some of them I've hated, but that's how recommendations work. The best part is that Hornby is someone who loves books, all kinds of books, from young adult science fiction books to heavy, serious classics. One of these days I really must try one of his novels.