High Fidelity

By: Nick Hornby

Narrated by: David Cale

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

“I've always loved Nick Hornby, and the way he writes characters and the way he thinks. It's funny and heartbreaking all at the same time.”—Zoë Kravitz

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.©1995 Nick Hornby; (P)1998 Putnam Berkley Audio

Critic reviews

"I've always loved Nick Hornby, and the way he writes characters and the way he thinks. It's funny and heartbreaking all at the same time."—Zoë Kravitz

"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 Fidelity fills 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, and Abbey Road. But then he's forced to consider loneliness, fitting-in, death, and failure—and that is 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."—Details

Poor audio quality / Great novel

There was a "ghost" of the narrator faintly through most of the recording. Also it seemed like there was a lot of white noise.

Not the full novel

I purchased the book and used a credit for the Audible title, so I could read while at home and listen while in the car. I had no clue that the Audible version skipped entire sections. Very disappointed.

Book is good but audio and narrator awful

Any additional comments?

The narration on this book is horrible! The guy is hard to understand and the accents he uses are atrocious. Also there is this background noise while listening... It sounds like the narrator is in a room with 5 other people also narrating a book at the same time. Poor quality audio, I'm very disappointed.

If you want to read this book I suggest doing it, just don't buy this audio version.

movie is better than this as its abridged.

This is a little over three hours, very little changes from the movie which I love, but Jack Blacks performance really brings the Barry character to life.

loved it!!!

The audio was amazing really enjoyable and the way the narrator made the different voices made it easy to depict which character is which.