Riverhead Books -- hcNew York -- ©2005 -- 333pp
ISBN: 1-57322-302-6
signed by Nick Hornby
Four people's lives become entwined when they meet on New Year's Eve, each with the intention of committing suicide.
I enjoyed this book, though I did feel that it had difficulty maintaining the story once we got to know each of the people involved (which happened fairly quickly -- at least by the end of the first third of the book).
The book is written from the point of view of each of the four people who had intended to kill themselves. For the most part, they were fairly interchangeable (they all seemed to react the same way towards each other) with the exception of the sheltered woman who has spent her life taking care of her whp os, for the most part, a vegetable.
The four people involved seem to be stock characters. Who you think they are at the beginning of the book is pretty much who they are at the end of the book, though perhaps a tad wiser in one or two cases.
I think that the American, "JJ" sums it up well:
"I had wanted to kill myself, not because I hated living, but because I loved it. ...We were up on the roof because we couldn't find a way back into life..."
I've read that many critics do not feel that this is Hornby at his best, and I'll likely read more of his work.
