OK, so I never claimed to be the quickest. I read “About a Boy” many years ago, and just the other day I had a couple of revelations about it:
First, he does a fantastic job of showing and not telling with his characters. For instance, he doesn’t say the main character is clueless about kids. He has him claim that his very young (made-up) son told him something eloquent like “Dad, I just want you to be happy.” Like, at an age when kids are hardly forming sentence. That’s good showing.
Second, I realized that as I read the book, I always assumed that the “Boy” of the title was the tween-aged boy who becomes attached to the main character. But now I’m realizing – because we watch the main character grow, and come to grips with the fact that he must evolve and finally grow up – I think HE, the grown man, is the “Boy” of the title.
Kind of brilliant, Hornby.
