Speaking with the Angel Pdf Summary Reviews By Nick Hornby

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Speaking with the Angel Pdf Summary

Twelve completely new stories, written by twelve of the most celebrated voices in fiction today; clever, outrageous, witty, edgy, tender, wicked… this is what they meant by “original.”

Bestselling author Nick Hornby has brought together a star-studded group of writers to create this one-of-a-kind collection of first-person narratives. Here are Melissa Bank, Roddy Doyle, Dave Eggers, Helen Fielding, Colin Firth, Robert Harris, Patrick Marbis, John O’Farrell, Giles Smith, Zadie Smith, Irvine Welsh, and Nick Hornby himself.

“Speaking with the Angel” is the anthology of the year: hot… hilarious… lively… literary… and all original.

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Speaking with the Angel Review

Inna Tysoe

TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE VOICE

5.0 out of 5 stars Wonderful anthology
Reviewed in the United States on October 17, 2016

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I grew up in a world where USA for Africa sang “We are the World” and so anytime anyone brings together a group of artists for a good cause, I pay attention. In Speaking with the Angel, Nick Hornby brought together a group of really well-known British writers to pen stories to benefit TreeHouse (a UK school for autistic children which his son attended). Of course if you buy the book in the US, the donation is split between TreeHouse and New York’s Child Learning Institute. And that alone made me look twice at the book.

But quite aside from the cause (which is wonderful) there are the stories. Because let’s face it: You don’t want to be guilted into buying a book. You can just as easily donate to TreeHouse and the Child Learning Center or to any other charity directly, after all. I loved most of them. There’s:

Robert Harris’ PMQ-a well-written if for me hard-to read story of a Prime Minister describing his breakdown to the House of Commons,

Melissa Banks’ The Wonder Spot-a wonderful story about a woman discovering that she is living the life she wants,

Giles Smith’s Last Requests- a story about the woman who prepares the last meals for people about to be executed. It’s a story that talks about the meals the condemned want and the meals her late husband ate. That was another one I found hard to read.

Patrick Merber’s Peter Shelley is probably not for everyone. It’s a short story about a teenager’s first, clumsy but eager sexual encounter.

Colin Firth’s The Department of Nothing—about a Grandmother who is dying, wants to go out one more time and gives her grandchild the gift of story-telling, possibly without even meaning to, I found really moving. The whole books is worth it if it was the only good story in it (in my opinion). But of course it isn’t.

Zadie Smith’s-I’m the Only One I didn’t like all that much. But then I am not a big Zadie Smith fan so maybe I’m prejudiced.

Nick Hornby’s NippleJesus was… wonderful. First of all, Nick Hornby so of course it was. But second of all it’s about how modern art and how easy we all are to manipulate. So, wonderful. Another short story that’s worth the whole book.

Dave Eggers’ After I was Thrown in the River and before I Drowned is OK. I really wanted to like it for our dogs’ sakes but it’s just OK.

Ditto for Helen Fielding’s Luckybitch. I really wanted to like this because it’s Helen Fielding but… again, it’s just OK.

Roddy Doyle’s The Slave more than makes up for the preceding two stories. It’s a breathless monologue told by a guy who sees a dead rat and has a midlife crisis. OK, now that I described that, it sounds really dorky but Doyle makes it work.

Irvine Welsh’s Catholic Guilt is hilarious. It’s about a homophobe who is punished by being made to walk the earth as a homosexual ghost.

John O’Farrell’s Walking into the Wind about a Mime artist is just sad. Incredibly well written but really sad. But maybe it’s just that I like happy endings.

So this anthology is filled with (almost) all good stories that are incredibly diverse. Perhaps you can say it’s about contemporary life but that’s about as much of a common theme as there is-which is to say, not much. Still, they’re great stories; the book introduced me to some great authors and it’s a great cause. I recommend it.

4.0 out of 5 stars some are excellent – others, less so – still worth a look
Reviewed in the United States on July 17, 2001

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Kudos to Nick Hornby for bringing together twelve of the brightest and best fiction writers today (10 Brits, 2 Americans) for a thought provoking compilation of short stories. I believe that a good short story can be just as difficult to compose as a novel (if not more so – the writer has a brief time to convincingly state his case, and somehow, we expect the ending to impact us more powerfully than a novel). Given these constraints, successful novel writers such as Helen Fielding and Zadie Smith are disappointingly not up to the task. Others, however, do not disappoint – Melissa Bank’s beautifully poignant love story is written with economy, yet really hits home. Irvine Welsh is his usual mind-in-the-gutter self – a brilliant writer with a wicked sense of humor. Roddy Doyle’s excellent depiction of a middle-aged man’s persective of his own nervous breakdown is deeply moving.
Praise also goes to Nick Hornby, Patrick Marber (who perfectly depicts a teenage Brit obsessing over music in the late 1970’s ), Giles Smith and Dave Eggers, whose surreal tale told by a dog is an absolute must-read (the last paragraph is stunning).
Overall, a good effort – 7 brilliantly written short stories, 3 not-too-bad ones, and two disappointments. Zadie Smith’s story is sloppily written and goes nowhere, while Helen Fielding really ought to stick to diaries of chardonnay-and-cigarette-loving singletons.
I recommend this book for the high quality of those stories I mentioned; and for the 2 dollar donation to schooling for children with autism that is included in the purchase price.

About Nick Hornby Author Of Speaking with the Angel pdf Book

Nick Hornby is the author of the novels Speaking with the Angel pdf Book, A Long Way Down, Slam, How to Be Good, High Fidelity, and About a Boy, and the memoir Fever Pitch. He is also the author of Songbook, a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award, Shakespeare Wrote for Money, and The Polysyllabic Spree, as well as the editor of the short-story collection Speaking with the Angel. He is a recipient of the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ E. M. Forster Award and the winner of the 2003 Orange Word International Writers’ London Award. Among his many other honors and awards, four of his titles have been named New York Times Notable Books. A film written by Hornby, An Education – shown at the Sundance Film Festival to great acclaim – was the lead movie at the 2009 Toronto Film Festival and distributed by Sony that fall. That same September, the author published his latest novel, Juliet, Naked to wide acclaim. Hornby lives in North London.