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<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4271.About_a_Boy?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="About a Boy" border="0" src="http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1210596850m/4271.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/4271.About_a_Boy?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">About a Boy</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/2929.Nick_Hornby">Nick Hornby</a> 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/8073217?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a>
 rating: 3 of 5 stars Will Freeman has some growing up to do. At 35, he lazes around all day listening to his CDs, watches "tele," dates serially and by nature keeps himself from any emotional entanglements, living off the royalties of a single Christmas tune his father wrote. After dating a single mother, Will discovers that a way to meet more single moms is to attend a single parent support group, conjuring up an imaginary son in the process to back up his story. Soon enough, his cover is blown, largely through the sleuthing of Marcus, a crafty yet socially aloof 12-year-old whose suicidal mother Fiona is also in the support group. Marcus soon develops an odd, quasi-fatherly attachment to Will, plotting on how to bring more stability into his own life by bringing Will into the picture. 
 
 Naturally, things get complicated and both Will and Marcus will grow, but not necessarily in the ways you might expect. Will will fall in love, but not with Fiona, and Marcus will experience pre-teenaged love for a feisty, Kurt Cobain-adoring rebel. 
 
 Nick Hornby's "About a Boy" is neither as insightful nor as stimluating as his "High Fidelity" and "Fever Pitch" (both unread by me, though I have seen the superior film versions of both). While thin on plot and believability, Hornby's strengths lay in his observations of human behavior and contemporary social relationships, all told from a uniquely British perspective. The author sprinkles the text with just enough in-the-know references to culture and, of course, popular music, to vouchsafe authenticity in favor of realism. 
 
 And yet the experience is strangely hollow. Will may have learned something and Marcus is on his way to adjusting to teenagehood, but what do we take away? Two adult role models are better than none? Got that already. Still, a brisk and interesting read. 
 
 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/123071?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>

Eric's review
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status: Read in October, 2007 — I have a copy to sell/swap

Will Freeman has some growing up to do. At 35, he lazes around all day listening to his CDs, watches "tele," dates serially and by nature keeps himself from any emotional entanglements, living off the royalties of a single Christmas tune his father wrote. After dating a single mother, Will discovers that a way to meet more single moms is to attend a single parent support group, conjuring up an imaginary son in the process to back up his story. Soon enough, his cover is blown, largely through the sleuthing of Marcus, a crafty yet socially aloof 12-year-old whose suicidal mother Fiona is also in the support group. Marcus soon develops an odd, quasi-fatherly attachment to Will, plotting on how to bring more stability into his own life by bringing Will into the picture.

Naturally, things get complicated and both Will and Marcus will grow, but not necessarily in the ways you might expect. Will will fall in love, but not with Fiona, and Marcus will experience pre-teenaged...more

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message 1: by Adel

09/06/2008 08:40AM

hi does any one know how will and marcus are alike or like one person