Nick Hornby Biography

Nick Hornby is the author of High Fidelity, About a Boy, and other novels of early-21st-century British manhood.

Hornby’s first book, Fever Pitch (1992), described his obsession with the football team Arsenal, and made him a literary star in the United Kingdom.

His subsequent novels, High Fidelity (1995) and About a Boy (1998), sealed his reputation worldwide as a crafty observer (and sometime victim) of pop music and pop culture.

In addition to his novels, Hornby has written non-fiction for magazines, including pop music criticism for The New Yorker.

Hornby’s books have also been made into successful movies: Fever Pitch (1997) starred Colin Firth, High Fidelity (2002) was relocated from England to the United States and starred John Cusack and About a Boy (2002) starred Hugh Grant. His other books include How to Be Good (2001), Long Way Down (2005) and the musical reverie 31 Songs (2003).

Nick Hornby then became a successful screenwriter — he’s been Oscar nominated for the screenplays to 2010’s An Education (starring Carrie Mulligan) and for 2016’s Brooklyn. He also wrote the screenplay to the Reese Witherspoon movie Wild (2014, based on the book by Cheryl Strayed).