Friday, May 21, 2010

How to be Good by Nick Hornby - DNF

I hate to say it, but I had to give up on this book.    I didn't like it much from the beginning, but thought I would give it 100 pages.  When I got to around 100 I still didn't really like it, but had decided I would continue with it.  Then the author just put something into the story that made me sit back and say "ok..this is just too far fetched and out there.  This isn't worth my time."  So I put it down and picked up something else.

The story is basically that of a husband and wife who have grown to hate each other.  They have two kids, the wife is a Dr, they live in a nice house and a good area, everything should be fine, but they really don't like each other anymore.  The husband is always angry, rants about everything.  The wife has this complex where she feels she is good, because she's a dr, and yet she's unhappy and has an affair.    Then the wife asks for a divorce, but the husband says he refuses to give it to her..just to spite her.   Then he suddenly changes and becomes all nice and caring, nothing bothers him and he wants to do good deeds...such as giving food to the homeless.  While this is what the wife tells herself she wants, once her husband changes she realizes she doesn't like this version of him either.    Then the guy she was having an affair with (she called it off when her husband started to act different) shows up at her door one Sunday evening and the three of them sit down to talk.  And that, ladies and gentlemen, is where I stopped reading.  

Personally..I disliked all the characters in the book.  The husband annoyed me because he was always so angry and did things to annoy the wife.  The wife annoyed me because she thought she was wonderful because she was a Dr. and everything was the husbands fault, and she did things just to annoy the husband too.  The last straw was when the guy she was having the affair with shows up at the door to talk, and while the wife is upset about this, her husband isn't.  They all sit around to chat and the husband is as nice and calm as can be.  This just doesn't happen in real life folks.  Or maybe it does, I don't know.  It just wasn't believable.

2 comments:

bermudaonion said...

Sorry to see it didn't work for you. I've never read any of Hornby's books and I've been wanting to try one. It sounds like this isn't the one to start with.

Unknown said...

Bermudaonion - I would definitely start with a different one. I was talking to somebody who really likes this author, but also didn't like this one..sounds like it was a flop all around.